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ESSAY ^fe^^__^ 



LIME AS A MANURE, 

BY M. PUVIS. 



TRANSLATED PROM THE FRENCH 



E. RUFFIN, ESQ. Editor oj the Farmei'a Register. 



INTRODUCTION, 



EXPLANATORY OP THE PRINCIPLES OF AGRICULTURAL CHEMISTRY, 



BY JAMES KENWICK, LL. D. 



PROFESSOK OF NAT. EXP. rHILOSOPUT AND CHEHISTRT IN COLUMBIA COLLEGE. 



NEW-YORK; 

SCATCHERD & ADAMS, PRINTERS, 
Xo. 3S Gold-street. 

1836. 



ON THE USE OF LIME AS A MANURE. 

BY M. PUVIS. • 



EDITOR'S PREFACE. 




The task of adapting an Introduction explanatory of the chemical principles most impor- 
tant in agriculture to the Essay of Mr. Puvis, was undertaken at the instance of a valued 
friend, James Wadsworth, Esq. of Geneseo. The translation which is employed was 
liberally placed at my disposal by the very intelligent and practically skilful editor of the 
Farmer's Register. He has the merit of first bringing the Essay of Mr. Puvis before the 
American public, and, taken in connexion with his own Essay on Calcareous Manures, he has 
thus made us acquainted not only with all that was previously known in the theory or practice 
of the use of Lime in agriculture, but has added himself some most valuable theoretic views, 
which he has also established by successful and judicious experiments on his own farm. 

James Renwick. 

Columbia College, March, 1836. 

A^ A 

PREFACE 

OF THE TRANSLATOR. 

The publication of the following communication to the Annaks de VJlgi-icuUiire Fran- 
catse, was commenced in the February No. of that journal, (which was received here in 
May,) and the June No. contains the end of the first part, " On Liming," and enables us to 
offer the translation of that portion to our readers. Only a few pages of the next portion 
of the series, " On Marling," has yet appeared, and not enough to permit a judgment to be 
formed of its worth. 

Though there are many deficiencies in this treatise on liming — and also opinions as to the 
theory of the action of lime, in which we cannot coincide — still, on the whole, we consider 
it as presenting far more correct views, and more satisfactory information, both on theory 
and practice, than any other work on liming that we have before seen. In other points, 
and those of most importance, the facts here presented (and now first learned from any Eu- 
ropean authority) strongly sustain the views maintained in the Essay on Calcareous Mw- 
tmrcs. It would be both unnecessary and obtrusive to remind the reader of these points of 
difference, and of agreement, whenever passages exhibiting either may occur. They will, 
therefore, generally be submitted ir, the author's words without comment. A few exceptions 
only to this rule will be made, in cases which appear particularly to call for them. 

We have no information whatever of Mr. Puvis, the author of this treatise, previous to the 
appearance of the commencement of the publication in the Annales. But he is evidently well 
informed on his subject, and is stated by the introductory remarks of the French editor, to be 
entitled to all respect, lor his long experience, and his practical as well as scientific investiga- 
tion of the subject. If, then, there remains no ground to distrust his judgment or his facts, the 
statements made are most important to a very large portion of this country, which has hereto- 
fore been generally supposed to be deprived of all possible benefit from the use of calcareous 
manures on account of their remoteness and high price of carriage. M. Puvis states that 
the most successful and profitable liming in Europe (for the expense incurred) is in repeat- 
ed applications of very small dressings — making less, on the average, than four bushels of 
lime to the acre, annually. This small amount, if really as efficacious as is alleged, would 
cost so little in labor and money, that the limits of the region capable of being limed may 
be very far extended. It would not matter though the applications should require to be re- 
peated for ever, provided the annual returns gave good profit upon the annual expenses ; 
and far greater will be the profit, if (as we think) the soil ultimately will no longer require 
such repetitions — or only at very distant intervals of time — and still be a highly productive, 
because it has been made a calcareous and fertile soil. 

I 



INTRODUCTION. 



The Chemical facts and principles which 
are applicable to Agriculture are neither nu- 
merous nor complex. They are, however, to 
be found only in works on General Chemis- 
try, in which they arc intimately associated 
with laws and phenomena of a more abstruse 
description, and in connexion with which they 
constitute a science of which the most learned 
are still i'tudents, and to attain which in its 
existing form may require years of close and 
attentive study. The language, too, of Che- 
mistry, which, to those who study it in a re- 
gular course, serves as an artifici.nl memory, 
and single words of which call up long trains 
of thought and experiment, presents to the 
uninitiated all the difficulties of a foreign 
tongue. 

Yet it cannot be doubted, that the practical 
farmer may derive important benefit from ac- 
quiring 30 much of this language as will ena- 
ble him to understand the chemical explana- 
tion of the numerous changes which are con- 
tinually taking place in the natural actions 
which it is his high privilege to call into his 
service, to direct in part, and modify in de- 
gree. So also are there certain chemical 
elements and compounds, with the properties 
of which he ought to be acquainted if he 
wish to be able to direct his practical skill 
with more effect, even in circumstances fa- 
miliar to him, but which may be absolutely 
necessary, or will at any rate save waste of 
labour and loss of time, when the know- 
ledge acquired by practice in one place is to 
be employed in a new situation, and under a 
change of circumstances. 

It is the object of this introduction to exhi- 
bit, in such form as may be intelligible to 
those who have not made general chemistry 
an object of study, a concise view of such of 
the laws and facts of that science, as are ab- 
solutely necessary for the agriculturist who 
may wish to improve his practice, and which 
are more particularly required by those who 
wish to avail themselves of the knowledge 
contained in the subjoined essay. To do 
this has been found no easy task. It would 
be in itself difficult, but to the au*hor of this in- 
troduction has been more particularly so, as 
he has for years been in the habit of impart- 
ing instruction to those whose habits of life 
and thoughts are as remote as possible from 
those of the practical farmer ; persons to 



whom the peculiar language of chemistry is 
an aid instead of an impediment ; and who, 
with ample time at their command, have an 
opportunity of pursuing the study of the sci- 
ence step by step. Fully aware of these diffi- 
culties, both general and peculiar, this attempt 
would not have been made, and certainly 
not persisted in, had it not have been for the 
instances of an intelligent, scientific, and 
successful farmer, who has urged the comple- 
tion of the task as an object likely to be 
beneficial to those, who, with perhaps equal 
zeal and native powers of mind, have not 
enjoyed, like himself, the advantages ofa sci- 
entific education. 

The atmosphere which surrounds our earth 
is the first object to which our attention 
should be directed. This is the vehicle of 
the moisture, which, whether it fall in the 
form of rain or dew, run in streams or issue 
from springs, is absolutely essential to the 
success of the farmer's labour. It is also, 
as we shall presently see, important to him 
on other accounts. 

The greater part of the atmosphere is 
made up of a mixture of substances, each 
of which has the same mechanical properties 
as the whole mass. These air-like substan- 
ces are known to chemists by the name of 
Gaits. 

Of these gases, two make up by far the 
greater portion of atmospheric air, and exist 
in it in the proportion of about four to one. 
That which is the largest in quantity and 
makes up nearly 4-5ths of the whole atmo- 
sphere, is called, in the Essay of M. Puvis, by 
the name of Azot, but is more usually known 
in English by the name of Nitrogen. 

This substance, although in the largest 
proportion, is the least important of the gases 
in its chemical effects. It does not aid in 
supporting the life of animals, nor in main- 
taining the burning (combustion) of inflamma- 
ble bodies. 

The part of the atmosphere which is abso- 
lutely necessary for these purposes, is called 
by the name of orj/o-en, and nearly makes up 
the remaining fifth part of atmospheric air. In 
its support of life it always, and in maintain- 
ing combustion often, unites with a chemical 
element, which is called carbon-. This is 
familiarly known as forming the principal 
part of charcoal. In its union with carbon. 



oxygen forms a peculiar gas known by the 
name of carbonic acid. 

Carbonic acid is always found in small 
quantities in the atmosphere, to which it is fur- 
nished by the breath of animals and the fumes 
of burning bodies. It is, when in considera- 
ble quantities, fatal to the life of animals, but 
is prevented from accumulating to an inju- 
rious extent in consequence of its being taken 
up by water ; it is therefore dissolved, in pro- 
portions about equal to those in which it is 
formed, by rivers, lakes, the ocean, and the 
moisture of the soil. 

Water exists in the atmosphere in the form 
of vapour. The great source of this vapour 
is the extended surface of the ocean ; and it is 
governed by a mechanical law, by which it is 
continually tending to distribute itself uni- 
formly over the whole surface of the earth. 
It may thus exist in as large quantities over 
the surface of the dryest land as over that of 
the ocean itself. This tendency to equal dis- 
tribution is continually counteracted by the 
changes in the sensible heat (temperature) 
of the atmosphere, and of the surface of the 
earth, which follow the alternations of day 
and night, and the vicissitudes of the seasons. 
By these alternations and changes, the vapour 
is caused to fall (precipitated) in the form of 
rain, snow, hail, dew, or white frost, accord- 
ing to circumstances. As such changes of 
temperature are more frequent on the land 
than on the ocean, the water which falls on 
the former in either of these forms is greater 
in quantity than that which falls on equal 
surfaces of the latter. Thus, by a wise and 
benevolent provision of Providence, the water 
of the ocean is continually furnishing vapour, 
which is precipitated on the land for the sup- 
port of vegetation and the supply of springs, 
and whose excess is poured back into the 
ocean in streams and rivers. 

Water has been found by chemists to be a 
• compound substance, made up of two ele- 
ments. One of these, which forms 8-9ths of 
its weight, is the gas already mentioned under 
the name of oxygen ; the other, a peculiar gas, 
known by the name of hydrogen. 

Hydrogen, when free, is the lightest of all 
known bodies, rising and floating in atmo- 
spheric air ; it not only combines with oxy- 
gen, to form water, but with carbon to form a 
great variety of compounds — gaseous, liquid, 
viscid, and solid. It also combines with nitro- 
gen, and forms a gas known by the name of 
ammonia, which is well known by the peculiar 
smell it gives to spirits of hartshorn (liquid 
ammonia). 

Hydrogen also combines with sulphur, 
forming a gas known by the name of sul- 
phuretted hydrogen ; this exists in the atmo- 



sphere, but in such small quantities as only to 
be detected by the nicest chemical tests. It 
combines in like manner with phosphorus, 
forming phosphuretted hydrogen gas, whose 
presence in the air is occasionally perceptible. 

Oxygen, as we have seen, unites with car- 
bon, to form a gas which we have called car- 
bonic acid. 

This receives the latter part of its name 
from its similarity in properties to an ex- 
tensive class of compound bodies, known 
by the name of The Acids. The greater 
part of these, like carbonic acid, are combina- 
tions of inflammable bodies with oxygen., The 
most important of these in reference to our 
present object, are the sulphuric and phos- 
phoric acids ; named from the two sub- 
stances (sulphur and phosphorus) which are 
their bases. Muriatic acid may also be men- 
tioned here, although its composition is of a 
different character. Oxygen unites w.tli other 
bodies to form a class of compounds known 
under the name of oxides. 

The acids unite with earths, alkalis, and 
metallic oxides, to form a class of compounds 
known under the general name of salts. 
These are named from the two substances 
which enter into their composition : thus, the 
salt formed of sulphuric acid and the earth 
hme, is called sulphate of lime. The sub- 
stances which unite with acids to form salts, 
are called the bases of the respective salts. 

Of these bases, the alkalis and earths are 
the most important. Of the alkalis, it is only 
necessary to know the names of two, namely 
potassa and soda, and to be aware that their 
distinctive properties, are : to possess an acrid 
taste, a caustic operation, to render oils ca- 
pable of mixing with water, and to neutral- 
ize the properties of acids. 

The earth which chemists call by the name 
of silex or silica, is found almost pure in flint 
and rock crystal ; it is also almost pure in 
sharp colourless sands, and is by far the 
larger part of sands of every description. 
So far as the farmer needknow its properties : 
it is bard, rough to the touch, has no attrac- 
tion for water, which it permits to filter 
through, or evaporate from it, with the great- 
est ease. It is capable of uniting with the 
other earths in compounds which are called 
silicates, and is the only earth which enters into 
the formation of soils uncombined with the 
others or with other elements. 

The earth which chemists call by the name 
of alumina, is so named because it is obtained 
by them in a pure form from the well-known 
salt called alum, of which it is the basis. 
Its most marked characteristic is plasticity : 
that is to say, it may be formed into a paste 
with water, will then easily receive any form 



which may be given it, and retain that form culture have not observed this distinction, 
unaltered, even by violent heaL It never and the term is sometimes applied by them to 
exists in soils unmixed, but in intimate asso- a decomposed chalk, which may contain little 
ciation, or more probably chemical combina- or no clay ; and sometimes to clay which 
tion with silica, it is the well-known substance contains no carbonate of lime. In fact, the 
called clay, or argillaceous earth. White name is frequently applied by them to any 
clays are this combination nearly pure, and earthy matter found below the vegetable 
coloured clays ot\en contain it with no other soil, which is capable of increasing its fertili- 
addition than metallic colouring matter, ty. From this misapprehension, the sub- 
Clay retains the plastic property of alumina ; stances which go by the name of marl in New 
it therefore causes soils to be retentive of Jersey, Maryland, and Virginia do not corre- 
moislure ; and. when they dry, makes ihe'u spond with the chemical definition, but are 
form tough clods or crusts, similar in charac- generally beds of fossil shells mixed in vari- 
ter to sun-dried brick. ous proportions with earthy and saline mat- 

Soils which contain clay are often also mix- ters of various kinds, 
ed with sand, or with an excess of silica in Lime is a substance very different in its 
grains, which does not enter into the compo- characters from the two earths of which 
sitioti of the clay. Such a soil is less liable we have previously spoken. When prepared 
to form a tough crust than a pure clay, but it by heat from any of the original forms of its 
will require a very large proportion of sand to carbonate, it retains their shape unaltered, 
destroy this property altogether. but may have its colour changed, and always 

Clay mixed with sandy soils renders them loses considerably in weight. It is now acrid, 
more retentive of moisture. Sand and clay caustic, and corrosive, and has some pro- 
have therefore been used as manures for each pertics in common with potash, which are 
other ; but . it may reasonably be doubted therefore alkaline. Of these the most im- 
whether ail the advantage that has been an- portant is, that it unites with acids to form 
ticipated by some from this process, can be compounds included in the general class of 
realized, as such a mixture will be merely salts. Of the salts of lime which are import- 
mechanical, ant to the farmer, the three principal are : 
I>oamy soils are generally said to be mix- the carbonate, which, as we have stated, is 
tures of .'!and and clay ; they undoubtedly found in limestone, chalk, shells, and marl ; 
usually contain both, these earths, and even the sulphate, in which lime is combined with 
sometimes a large excess of sand. But we sulphuric acid, and which in combination 
shall give reasons for believing that loams owe with water is the substance so well known to 
their peculiar value to a combination of clay our farmers under the name of plaster of 
with another substance, by which a change is Paris, or less familiarly by that of gypsum : 
produced in its chemical characters. the phosjihale, which constitutes a large part 

Lime is familiarly known to farmers by of the bones of animals, 
the same name that is generally used by Lime, when exposed to the air, attracts car- 
chemists. It is obtained by the aid of heat bonic acid, which is always to be found in 
from rocks which go by the name of lime- the atmosphere ; it thus passes back to the 
stones. These are combinations of lime state of carbonate, but in so doing gradually 
with carbonic acid, which is fixed in them falls to powder, and is then said to be air- 
by chemical attraction, but w hich, when slaked. If slaked with water, it also falls 
driven off by heat, takes the same form as the to a powder, which still retains the caustic 
air of the atmosphere, or becomes a gas. character of the burnt lime ; but this powder, 
This gas from this circumstance has been when exposed to the air, unites with carbonic 
called fixed air, by which name it is often acid more rapidly than when in mass, 
known when causing the sparkling and froth Lime, in its caustic state, has the property 
of cider and beer. The principal part of lime- of rapidly decomposing vegetable and ani- 
stone is therefore called by chemists carbon- njal substances, thus hastening the natural 
ate of lime. Carbonate of lime is also found in processes by which they are finally destroyed ; 
shells, both those of living animals and those or, to speak more properly, have their ele- 
which exist in the ground in a fossil stale, ments resolved into new combinations. The 
In the former it is mixed with animal matter, offensive and unwholesome gases, which are 
which is more or less separated from the lat- given out by this composition, are absorbed by 
ter according to the time which has elapsed the lime, and prevented from mixing with the 
since the death of the shell fish. air. The same property is possessed in a 

Marl, in the sense in which the term is used less degree by the carbonate of lime, and 
by chemists, is a mixture of clay with carbon- probably by its otlier compounds ; but in order 
ate of lime. The English writers on agri- that either this earth or its compounds shall 



manifest this property, they must be in small 
fragments, or, which is better, in fine pow- 
der. 

Wet sand and plastic clay, and those soils 
to which they give their characters, also pos- 
sess the property of absorbing gases ; but 
they have this in a very inferior degiee to 
lime and its compounds. As the gases gene- 
rated by the decomposition of vegetable and 
animal substances form a large part of the 
necessary food of plants, it is obvious that a 
soil which contains the carbonate of lime, 
may retain and store them up for use, while 
they will be lost in soils of a different charac- 
ter. 

Carbonate of lime may also be made a 
most important article in the preservation of 
the most valuable parts of putrescent ma- 
nures, until they can be applied to the soil. 
In this way marl is applied to a great extent 
in China ; the night soil of their numerous 
population is there formed into cakes hke 
bricks, with marl, and thus loses its offensive 
smell ; but when these are applied as manure 
to the land, they give out the gases again as 
they are required for the nourishment of 
plants. So also in Norfolk, the site for 
dunghills is prepared by a layer of marl, 
which is incorporated with the manure from 
time to time, and retains the gases which 
would otherwise be lost. 

Lime may therefore be applied in its 
caustic form in some cases in Agriculture, 
for it will hasten the decomposition of animal 
and vegetable matters which might otherwise 
be inert ; it will also neutralize acids, which 
experienced farmers well know to exist in 
many soils, which they in consequence call 
sour. But the latter purpose will be answer- 
ed as well by the carbonate of lime, which 
may be applied as it exists in marl or shells, 
or as it may be prepared by grinding lime- 
stone. Caustic lime is also dangerous in its 
application, for it will corrode and destroy 
living vegetables, and hasten the decomposi- 
tion of the vegetable matter of the soil to such 
a degree as to injure its fertility. Except 
upon turf-bogs, and land loaded with timber 
not wholly decomposed, quick or caustic lime 
ought not to be used ; but to burn lime, and 
then by slaking to reduce it to the form of 
fine powder, which is speedily carbonated by 
exposure to the air, is a more ready, and ge- 
nerally acheaper mode of obtaining the carbon- 
ate iu a convenient form, than to grind lime- 
stone to powder in mills. Yet for many of 
the most valuable uses of lime in agriculture, 
the latter method, if as cheap, would answer 
as well. 

Lime slowly combines with the earth silica, 
and produces a compound very different in 



character from either. It is this, to cite a 
fact in proof of our statement, which gives the 
hardness and solidity to ancient mortar. The 
carbonate of lime will serve to form this com- 
pound ; and thus, when it has had time to act 
upon sand, it renders a silicious soil more re- 
tentive of moisture ; while, if applied to clay, 
by combining with its silicious matter, it 
renders it more friable ; and it is to the forma- 
tion of this compound by slow degrees, that 
we are inclined to ascribe the valuable me- 
chanical properties of loamy soils, and the 
gradual amelioration produced by the use of 
lime, marl, and shells as a manure. 

Besides silica, alumina, and lime,an earth call- 
ed magnesia is likewise found in some soils. 
It is also, in the form of carbonate, a frequent 
constituent of limestones. This earth has 
many properties in common with lime ; like 
lime it is capable of neutralizing acids ; and 
when deprived of carbonic acid by heat, cor- 
rodes vegetable substances. It probably 
also hastens putrefaction, and both it and 
its carbonate are capable of absorbing the 
gases let loose in that natural process. It is, 
however, of little interest in agriculture, except 
as a part of some of the limestones which are 
used as manure. These, if applied in large 
quantities, are sometimes very injurious to 
vegetation ; the reason of this is, that magne- 
sia does not repass to the state of carbonate 
as rapidly as lime, and therefore retains its 
corrosive quality long after the lime has again 
become mild by its union with carbonic acid. 
In less quantities, however, the magnesian 
limestones may serve as a manure, but their 
application requires great caution, particular- 
ly when the quantity of magnesia amounts to 
25 per cent. 

All of the simple substances we have men- 
tioned, except perhaps the last, either separate 
or in various states of combination, ex- 
ist in plants. The manner and character of 
the combination is influenced by the vital ac- 
tion of the plant, which causes Ihem to form 
compounds, oflen in direct opposition to th 
manner in which the ordinary laws of chemis- 
try would direct. It thus happens that so 
soon as the plant ceases to live, these chemi- 
cal laws, being no longer impeded, begin to 
exert their influence ; and if it be in such a 
state as will admit of the several elements 
acting readily upon each other, a decomposi- 
tion, more or less rapid, of the vegetable 
structure ensues. It is a law of chemistry, 
that its action is always aided by the bodies 
being in a fluid state, and the action is often 
impossible when the bodies are perfectly free 
from moisture. Hence the direct chemical 
action, and consequent decomposition, takes 
place with greater certainty and more rapidi- 



6 



tjr in green juicy and succulent vegetables, 
than upon those which have been deprived 
of moisture either naturally or artificially. 
Thus grass, ifheapcd up in a recent stale, de- 
composes, and if but partially dried, is heated, 
and may even take fire, by the chemical ac- 
tion of its elements ; while, if dried by expo- 
sure to the sun and air, and then laid up in a 
dry place in the form of hay, it is almost in- 
destructible. A moderate degree of heat and 
access to air are also necessary to promote 
the chemical action by which decomposition 
is effected. This decomposition is often at- 
tended with motion among the parts ; and 
always, if the mass has a liquid form, as in 
the expressed juice of vegetables, or in 
the steeps employed by distillers and brew- 
ers ; it goes in general terms by the name of 
fermentation. When the vegetable matter 
abounds in starch, the first change is the con- 
version of this principle into sugar. Sugar, 
if thus formed, is next converted into alcohol, 
as it is, if it previously existed in the plant. 
The presence of alcohol gives the liquid in 
which it exists the character of vinous liquors, 
and if these are permitted to remain in a 
turbid state, a farther fermentation converts 
them into vinegar ; and finally vinegar is 
farther decomposed, and the vegetable mat- 
ter, giving out an offensive smell, is said to 
putrify. If the substance be not an express- 
ed juice or liquid steep, these several stages 
offermentation ensue with rapidity, may be 
going on at the same time, and are sometimes 
sospeedy in their course that no other actionbut 
the putrefactive fermentation can be detected. 
Animal bodiesare subject to the same laws, and 
go through the same stages of fermentation, 
but the rapidity which ihey run into putrefaction 
is even greater ; still there are some cases, 
as in that of milk, where the vinous stage can 
be occasionally, and the acetic distinctly, ob- 
served. Thus, a vinous liquor is prepared in 
some countries from milk, and the sour taste 
which appears in it when kept, arises from 
the presence of vinegar. 

In the several stages of fermentation, parts 
of the vegetable assume the form of gas or 
vapour, and are given out to the air. The 
gases which have been detected, are carbonic 
acid, a gaseous compound of carbon and hy- 
drogtn, and in some instances ammonia. The 
vapour is that of water, which escapes in 
greater quantities than it would under ordina- 
ry circumstances, in consequence of the 
heat with which the process is attended. If 
exposed to rain, soluble salts, with earthy and 
alkaline bases, are washed from the mass. 
Finally, a mass of earthy consistence alone 
remains, which on examination is found to 
be made up of earths, insoluble salts, and 



carbon, being, in fact, identical with vegetable 
mould. 

We may hence infer that the following ele- 
ments exist in vegetable bodies : 

1. Oxygen, developed in the carbonic acid 

and water. 

2. Hydrogen is in the water and carbu- 

rets of hydrogen. 

3. Carbon. 

4. Earths. 
6. Alkalis. 

6. Nitrogen, occasionally developed in the 

form of ammonia. 

7. Acids, remaining in the insoluble, or 

washed away in the soluble salts. 
The chemical examination of vegetable 
bodies ought of course lead to similar re- 
sults. This examination has been conduct- 
ed in three different ways. 
,1. With the view of discovering the nature 
of the compounds, called vegetable 
principles, which exist ready formed 
in plants. 

2. For the purpose of discovering the che- 

mical elements contained in these 
principles. 

3. By the destructive action of heat, under 

which some of the elements are whol- 
ly separated, and others enter into 
new combinations. 
In the first of these methods there have 
been detected : 

I. Certain peculiar acids, of which we may 

cite 

(1) Acetic acid, which, mixed with water, 

forms common vinegar ; 

(2) Citric acid, which is found in the 

lemon and orange. 

(3) Malic acid, which exists in the apple; 

(4) Tartaric acid, in the juice of the 

grape; 
(6) Oxalic acid in the wild sorrel. 

II. Certain substances of alkaline charac- 

ter, found principally in medicinal 
plants, to which they give their pecu- 
liar virtues. 

III. Gum, resin, oils, sugar, starch, and 
two substances approaching to animal 
matter in their characters, namely, al- 
bumen and gluten ; the former of 
these has a resemblance to the white 
of eggs, the latter to animal jelly or 
glue. 

Many other principles are separated by the 
same method in different plants, but need 
not be enumerated by us. 

The basis of this method consists in act- 
ing upon vegetables by water, ether, or recti- 
fied spirits (alcohol), and the principles above 
enumerated are either simply, or in the state 
of combination in which they exist in plants. 



soluble in at leasfone of the liquids we have 
named. 

In all cases some insoluble matter is left, 
and this is known by the name of the woody 
fibre. 

AVhen these principles are treated by the 
second method, oxygen, hydrogen, and car- 
bon, are the uniform results, but in different 
proportions in the different cases ; nitrogen 
is also detected in some of .them, as, for in- 
stance, in the alkaline principles and in gluten. 
This method does not appear to be adequate 
to determine whether earths and alkalis are, 
or are not, parts of these vegetable princi- 
ples. From the very remarkable fact, that 
some of those substances, which are very dis- 
similar to each other, yield exactly the same 
proportions of oxygen, hydrogen, and carbon, 
we may fairly conclude by chemical analogy, 
that one or the other, or perhaps both, contain 
some substances which have escaped the 
analysis. As an instance we may cite starch 
and sugar, whose characters are so dissimilar 
that no danger can exist of mistaking the one 
for the other ; and yet their analysis by tlie 
second method gives identical results. 

The third method may be understood by 
comparing it with the process used in making 
charcoal. If this be so far altered that the 
heat employed shall not arise from the com- 
bustion of a part of the substance to be ex- 
amined, but from one merely used as fuel, 
and if the matters which escape in smoke are 
condensed and collected, we shall have 
that employed occasionally on a large 
scale by operative chemists. In this way 
charcoal will be, as usual, obtained in the 
solid form. The condensible products will be 
water, tar, turpentine, or resin ; and the acid 
which gives that character to vinegar, but 
which in the present case, in union with the 
tar and water, is called pyrolignous acid. 

If the charcoal be burnt in a current of air, 
all its carbon is converted, by union with the 
oxygen of the atmosphere, into carbonic acid, 
leaving a residue famiharly known as ashes. 
The ashes are made up partly of soluble 
and partly of insoluble matter. The soluble 
matter is separated by the familiar process 
of making ley, and the ley, if evaporated, 
leaves the solid substance so well known as 
potash. 

Potash is principally composed of a carbon- 
ate of potassa, but contains, besides silica, 
rendered soluble by the alkali, sulphate and 
muriate of potassa, and a peculiar acid known 
by the name of ulmic, which is a compound 
of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen. The inso- 
luble part is made up of carbonate of lime, 
sulphate and sometimes phosphate of lime, 
silica. The carbonate of lime has probably 



in no case existed in the living plant, but 
arises from the destruction by heat of the pe- 
culiar acid of the plant ; as, for instance, the 
citric, the oxalic, or the tartaric ; all of which 
are by fire converted into carbonic acid. 

The quantity of ashes is extremely various, 
as is their proportion of the several soluble 
and insoluble substances, we have mention- 
ed. Thus the ashes of the stalk of Indian corn 
yields 12} percent, of ashes, while the soft 
woods do not furnish more than two parts in a 
thousand. The proportion of the sulphate and 
phosphate of lime is even more various. 
Thus, in some cases the presence of the 
sulphate is hardly perceptible, while of the 
ashes of clover it forms a large proportion of 
the whole weight. Phosphate of lime is found 
in the proportion of fifteen per cent, in the 
grain of wheat. 

Water is not only one of the principal 
component parts of all plants, but is also 
the sole vehicle of their nutriment. At each 
extremity of the small fibres into which the 
roots of plants are divided, is an opening 
through which that fluid enters ; and it ap- 
pears that, except in the case of a plant hav- 
ing lost its vigour by continued drought, it is 
only through this channel that water can en- 
ter. By a powerful action inherent in living 
vegetables, water, which with all the mat- 
ters it is capable of holding in solution, be- 
comes the sap,* is raised to the highest parts 
of the plants, and forced to their most distant 
extremities. It has been ascertained that 
plants do not possess the power of rejecting 
even those substances which ai-e most nox- 
ious to them ; it is therefore probable that the 
character of the fluid admitted is the same in 
all the plants which grow upon the same soil. 
Whether it undergoes any change in the root 
does not appear certain, but it has recently 
been maintained that every description of 
plant throws oflf by the surface of its roots 
such matter as, if retained, would be injurious ; 
but tbis opinion does not appear to be well 
established. 

The sap, when carried up to the leaves, un- 
dergoes an important change, principally ow- 
ing to the action of solar light. When ex- 
posed to light, the leaves of plants give out 
oxygen in considerable quantities. This 
proceeds from a decomposition of the water 
and carbonic acid, the remaining elements of 
which two substances and a portion of their 
oxygen enter into new combinations. These 
combinations have different characters in dif- 
ferent vegetables, but are most familiarly 
known in the shape of gum and resin. These 
still contain the earthy and saUne matter carried 

* See Roget's Bridgewater Treatise. 



8 • 



up by the sap, and after they are formed re- 
turn downwards towards the roots. In their 
descent they deposit the several parts which 
minister to the growth of the plant — the leaves, 
the bark, and the woody fibre. They also 
appear to be forced with powerful energy 
into the flower and the growing fruit, and in 
these a still more important action is carried 
fo^^vard, by which the reproduction of the 
species is ensured. 

The matters which the water that enters by 
the root may hold in solution, are either de- 
rived from the atmosphere or from the soil. 
In its passage through the air it will carry 
with it a considerable proportion of carbonic 
acid, and all the sulphuretted hydrogen it 
meets with. It will also take up a small 
quantity of oxygen, and of carburetted hy- 
drogen, and a still less quantity of nitrogen. 
From the soil it will take all the more solu- 
ble salts, small quantities of sulphate, phos- 
phate, and carbonate of lime, provided they 
be present, and silica. So also if the soil 
contain animal matter, or vegetables of which 
nitrogen forms a part, the ammonia generated 
by their decomposition will likewise be dis- 
Bolvedbythe water. Inlike manner the carbon- 
ic acid, which has arisen from the decomposi- 
tion of vegetable or animal matter, and has 
not yet escaped, and the soluble compounds 
of carbon, oxygen, and hydrogen, which are 
generated by the same process, will have been 
taken up, and carried by the water into the 
root of the plant. It will thus appear that, 
contrary to the opinion of Mr. Puvis,the atmo- 
sphere furnishes butlittle of the fixed elements 
of plants, with the exception of sulphur and 
carbon ; and that even if the growth of plants 
were to depend wholly upon the carbon obtain- 
ed in the form of carbonic acid from the atmo- 
sphere, their growth must be slow and feeble. 
It will also appear, that if lime do not exist in 
the soil, but few plants can find nourishment ; 
and that for the ripening of the seeds of grain 
phosphorus must be furnished also. The 
latter substance may be absorbed in small 
quantities from the phosphuretted hydrogen. 



which is occasionally present in the atmo- 
sphere ; but a more certain supply ought to b« 
sought in putrescent manure, and particularly 
in that of aHimal origin. 

The uses of lime in agriculture, as will ap- 
pear from the foregoing remarks and the 
reasoning of the essay, are as follows : 

1. When a soil contains inert animal or 
vegetable matter, their decomposition may be 
promoted, and it may be rendered fit for the 
food of plants, by the addition of caustic lime. 

2. If the soil contain acid, that may be 
neutralized either by caustic or carbonated 
lime, and besides, the organic matter whose 
decomposition may have been prevented by 
the acid, will be permitted to pulrify. 

3. Soils containing too much silica, or in 
other words those which are sandy, are made 
more retentive of moisture by the addition 
of lime or its carbonate. 

4. Clays, may be rendered less retentive 
of moisture, and more friable by the same 
means. 

5. The gases which escape when vege- 
table or animal matter putrify, are retained in 
the soil by means of lime or its carbonate ; 
and thus a given quanity of manure, or the 
original vegetable matter of the soil, will re- 
tain its efficacy longer. By a recent disco- 
very, it has also been ascertained that the 
decomposition of plants yields a peculiar acid, 
called the humic, which forms with lime a 
salt sparingly soluble in water. The gene- 
ration of this salt also serves to render the 
neutriment contained in the soil more lasting. 

6. Lime and its compounds are absolutely 
necessary, as constituent parts, to the growth 
of many plants. The sulphate is essential to 
the growth of clover, and the phosphate to 
that of wheat. Hence the efficacy of plaster 
of Paris and crushed bones as manures. 

7. Iflinieorits sulphate be employed as 
the means of raising green crops, which have 
but small exhausting powers, the fertility of a 
soil may be maintained by ploughing ihem 
in, or increased by using them to feed cattle 
whose manure is applied to the ground. 



9 



ON THE USE OF LIME AS A MANURE, BY MR. PUVIS. ' 



On the Different Modes of Improving 
Soil. 



the 



To improve the soil is to modify its composi- 
tion in such manner as to render it more fertile. 
This definition, which might be extended to 
manures charged with vegetable mould [/iu- 
mtisj or animal substances, which also modify 
the composition of the soil, is limited by 
French agriculture to substances which act 
upon tlie soil, or upon plants, without contain- 
ing any notable proportion of animal or vege- 
table matter. 

It is said that manures, [putrescent or en- 
riching,] serve for the nutriment of plants. 
But it is the same as to substances improving 
to the soil, which furnish to it matters which 
it needs to be fruitful, and which furnish to 
vegetables, the earth and saline compounds 
which enter as essential elements in their 
composition, their texture, and their products. 
Such improving substances may well be re- 
garded as nutritive.* 

Thus lime, marl, and all the calcareous 
compounds employed in agriculture, since 
they furnish lime and its compounds, which 
sometimes form half of the fixed principles of 
vegetables, ought also to be considered as ali- 
ments ; or, what comes to the same, as fur- 
nishing apart of the substance of vegetables. 
Thus again, wood-ashes, pounded bones, 
burnt bones, which furnish to vegetation the 
calcareous and saline phosphates which com- 
pose a sixth of the fixed principles of the 
stalks, and three-fourths of their seeds, ought 
well to be considered, and surely are, nutritive. 
What, then, particularly marks the distinc- 
tion between manures which improve the 
soil [ameJirfemcHs] and alimentary manures, 
[cjiCfrais] is, that the former furnish, for the 
greater part, the fixed principles of vegeta- 
bles, the earths, and salts, which are abun- 
dantly diflused throughout the atmosphere, 

* The two classes of manures wliich are described 

fcnerally above, arc conveniently d'^signated in 
'rencii eacli by a single word. ^*£»grais,^' which 
wo can only translate as manure, is liniiti d in signifi- 
cation to such substances as directly enrich soils and 
feed growing plants — and " ainendemcns," signifying 
substances which alter and improve the constitution, 
texture, and indirectly, the Ibrtilily of soil, but the ope- 
ration of whicli is not to furnish food to plants. In 
speaking of the actimi of these difi'orenl classes, the 
• ensc may be rendered, though not very ]>recisely, by 
tlie words " enrich" and "improve;" bul there is no 
one English term that will convey the meaning of 
either class of substances. ** Alimentary manures" 
will be used for the first class, and " manures improv- 
ing the constitution of soil," or some similar awkward, 
but descriptive phrase, can only render the meaning 
of the word "amendemcns," unless "improvers" 
could be tolerated as a substitute for convenience. Tr. 



whence vegetables draw them, by means of 
suitable organs ; and what is most remarka- 
ble, is, that the vegetable, by receiving the 
fixed principles of which it has need, ac- 
quires, as we shall see, a greater energy to 
gather for its sustenance the volatile princi- 
ples which the atmosphere contains. 

The greater part, then, of soils, to be car- 
ried to the highest rate of productiveness, 
require manures to improve their constitu- 
tion. Alimentary manures give much vigor 
to the leafy products — but they multiply 
weeds, both by favoring their growth and 
conveying their seeds ; and they often cause 
crops of [small grain] to be lodged, when 
they are heavy. Manures which improve 
the soil, more particularly aid the formation 
of the seeds, give more solidity to the stalks, 
and prevent the falling of the plants. But it 
is in the simultaneous employment of these 
two means of fertilization by which we give 
to the soil all the active power of which it is 
susceptible. They are necessary to each 
other, doubling theiraction reciprocally; and 
whenever they are employed together, fertility 
goes on without ceasing ; increasing instead 
of diminishing. 

The greater part of improving substances 
are calcareous compounds. Their efTect is 
decided upon all soils which do not contain 
lime, and we shall see that three-fourths, per- 
haps, of the lands of France are in that 
state. Soils not calcareous, whatever may 
be their culture, and whatever may be the 
quantity of manure lavished on them, are 
not suitable tor all products ; are often cold 
and moist, and are covered w ith weeds. Cal- 
careous manures, by giving the lime which is 
wanting in such soils, complete their advan- 
tages, render the tillage more easy, destroy 
weeds, and fit the soil for all products. 

Improving substances have been called 
slimulanls ; they have been thus designated, 
because it was believed that their effect con- 
sist( d only in stimulating the soil and the 
plants. This designation is faulty, because 
it would place these substances in a false 
point of view. It would make it seem that 
they brought nothing to the soil nor to plants ; 
ami yet their principal effect is to give both 
principles which are wanting. Thus the 
main effect of calcareous manures proceeds 
from their giving, en the one hand, to the soil 
the calcareous principle which it does not 
contain, and which is necessary to dcvelope 
its full action on the atiriosphere ; and, on the 
other hand, to vegetables, the quantity which 
they require of this principle for their frame- 
work and their intimate constitution. It 



10 



would then be a better definition than that 
above, to say, tliaf to itiijirove the soil is to give 
to it the principles which it requires, and 
does not contain. 

ImportaiKt of J^Ianures tchich improve the 
CoMlilulion of Soils. 

The question of improving manure is of 
great interest to agriculture. This means of 
meliorating the soil is too little known, and 
above all, too little practised in a great part 
of France ; and yet it is a condition abso- 
lutely necessary to the agricultural prosperity 
of a country. In the neighborhood of great 
cities, alimentary manures being furnished on 
good terms may well vivify the soil ; but ani- 
mal manures can suffice only in a few situa- 
tions, and those of small extent ; and in 
every country where tillage is highly prospe- 
rous, improving manures are in use. The 
Department of the North (of France) Belgi- 
um, and England owe to them, in a great 
measure, their prosperity. The Department 
of the North (which is, of all Europe, the 
country where agriculture is best practised 
and the most productive,) spends every 
year, upon two-thirds of its soil, a million of 
francs in lime, marl, ashes of peat and of 
bituminous coal [/louiV/e*], and it is princi- 
pally to these agents, and not to the quality of 
the soil, that the superiority of its produc- 
tion is owing. The best of its soil makes 
part of the same basin, is of the same forma- 
tion and same quality, as a great part of Ar- 
tois and Picardy, of which the products are 
scarcely equal to half the rate of the North. 
Neither is it the quantity of meadow land 
which causes its superiority ; that makes but 
the fifth part of its extent, and Lille, the best 
ArrondissemenI, has scarcely a twentieth of 
its surface in meadow, while Avesnc, the 
worst of all, has one-third. Nor can any 
great additional value be attributed to ar- 
tificial meadows, since they are not met with 
except in the twenty-sixth part of the whole 
space. Neither can this honor be due to the 
suppression of naked fallows, since, in this 
country of pattern husbandry, they yet take 
up one-sixth of the ploughed land every year. 
Finally, the Flemings have but one head of 
large cattle for every two hectares! of land, a 
proportion exceeded in a great part of 
France. Their great products then are due to 
their excellent economy and use of manures, 
to the assiduous labor of the farmers, to 
courses of crops well arranged, but, above 
all, we think, to the improvers of soil, which 

♦ Statistique du department du Nord. 
■( The hectare is very nearly equal to two and a 
half English (or American) acres. Tr. 



they join to tlieir alimentary manures. Two 
thirds of their land receive these regularly ; 
and it is to the reciprocal action of these 
agents of melioration, that appears to be due 
the uninterrupted succession of fecundity 
which astonishes all those who are not accus- 
tomed continually to see the products of this 
region. 

At this moment, upon all points in France, 
agriculture, after the example of the other 
arts of industry, is bringing forth improve- 
ments ; in all parts especially, cultivators are 
trying, or wishing to try, lime, marl, ashes, 
animal charcoal. It is this particular point in 
progress, above all, for wliich.light is wanting ; 
and this opinion has induced the preparation 
c*" this publication. For more than thirty 
years the author has devoted himself, from 
inclination, to agriculture ; but he has been 
especially attentive to calcareous manures. 
He has studied in the practice of much ex- 
tent of country, in that of his own particular- 
ly, in personal experiments, and in what has 
been written on them, both by foreigners and 
countr)'meu. An Essay on Marl has been 
the first fruit of his labors, an Essay on the 
•use of Lime will soon be ready : it is with 
these materials that he now sets himself to 
work. To prepare for this object, a series of 
articles, of tbc nature of a recapitulation ra- 
ther tlian of a regular work, it was necessary 
to be concise, and yet not to omit any thing 
essential. It is proper, then, that he should 
limit himself to the prominent parts of his 
subject, those especially useful to practice. 
His advice will then be as often empirical as 
regular, and his directions will be precise, al- 
though supported by a few developements. 

An extract from this work has appeared in 
the Encyclopedie Jlgricole : here it will again 
appear, but in the form of separate articles, 
which will be corrected by a general system- 
atic view of the theory, founded on prac- 
tice. This is the moment for multiplying 
publications on this subject, because in al- 
most all parts of France it is the point in 
agriculture most controverted; that which in- 
duces the most labor and the greatest expen- 
diture ; which presents most doubts ; and 
which has consequently most need of being 
made clear. 

We shall not here enlarge upon the man- 
ner in which improving manures act : we will 
put olT this important question, with its de- 
velopements, to the article on lime. Here we 
only present the theory. Hereafter, that 
which we will hazard will be founded upon 
facts, and yet we do not promise these deve- 
lopements, except so far as may be necessary 
for the purpose of enlightening and directing 
practice. 



11. 



Of the various kind) oj Improving Manures. 

The first in order, and the most important, 
are calcareous manures. We comprehend 
under this name, lime, marl, old plastering 
mortar, and other rubbish of demolished 
buildings, beds of fossil shells [_/«/««],* or 
shelly substances, plaster or gypsum : expe- 
rience and reason will prove that we ought to 
arrange in the same class, and by the side of 
the others, wood ashes, ground bones, and 
burnt bones. We will not place in the same 
list the ashes of peat, of bituminous coal, and 
red pyritous ashes : their effect is not owing 
to their lime, but (as will be seen afterwards) 
rather to the effect of fire upon the earthy 
parts, and particularly upon the argil which 
they contain. 

We shall next in order treat of manures of 
the sea, or saline manure of different kinds, of 
mixtures of earth, of calcined clay : and 
finally, of paring and burning turf, and the 
different questions which peat presents in 
agriculture. 

Of Liming — On the Use of Lime for the Im- 
provement of Soil. 

1. Among the immense variety of sub- 
stances, and of combinations which compose 
the upper layers of the globe, the earthy sub- 
stances, silex, alumine, and lime, form al- 
most exclusively the surface soil : the greater 
portion of other substances being unfit to aid 
vegetation, they ought to be very rare upon a 
surface where the Supreme Author willed to 
call forth and to preserve the millions of spe- 
cies of beings of all kinds, which were to 
live on its products. 

It was also a great benefit to man, whose 
intelligence was to be exercised upon the 
surface of the soil, to have so few in number 
the substances proper to support vegetation. 
The art of agriculture, already so complex, 
which receives from so many circumstances 
such divers modifications, if there had been 
added new elements much move complicated, 
would have been above the reach of human 
intelligence. 

2. But among these substances, the two 
first, silex and alumine, form almost exclu- 
sively three-fourths of all soils ; the third, the 
carbonate of hme, is found more or less 
niLxed in the other fourth : all soils in which 

*" Falun. Beds formed by shells. There is one 
of these immense beds in Touraine. The cultivators 
of that country use this shelly earth to improve their 
fields." This definition is from Rozier's Cours Cotn- 
plet, and though it clearly shows that the substance in 
question is the same as what is called " marl" in Vir- 
ginia, it is equally clear that neither of these authors 
consider /ojtin as being mart. Tb. 



the latter earth is found, have similar charac- 
ters, producing certain families of vegetables, 
which cannot succeed in those in which it is 
not contained. 

The calcareous element seems to be in the 
soil a means and a principle of friability. 
Soils which contain calcareous earth in suit- 
able proportions, suffer but little from mois- 
ture, and let pass easily, to the lower beds, the 
superabundance of water, and consequently 
drain themselves with facility. Grain and 
leguminous crops, the oleaginous plants, and 
the greater part of the vegetables of com- 
merce, succeed well on these soils. 

It is among these soils that almost all good 
lands are found. Nevertheless, the abun- 
dance of the calcareous principle is more 
often injurious than useful. Thus it is 
among soils composed principally of carbon- 
ate of lime that we meet with the most arid 
and barren, as Lousy Champagne, part of 
Yonne, and some parts of Berry. 

3. The analysis of the best soils hag 
shown that they rarely contain beyond ten 
per cent, of carbonate of lime ; and those of 
the highest grade of quality seem to contain 
but from 3 to 5 per cent. Thus the analysis 
of Messrs. Berthier and Drapiez show 3 
per cent, of it in the celebrated soil of the en- 
virons of Lille. 

4. But all these properties, all these ad- 
vantages, all these products, calcareous ma- 
nures bear with them to the soils which do 
not contain the calcareous principle. It is 
sufficient to spread them in very small pro- 
portions : a quantity of lime, which does not 
exceed the thousandth part of the tilled sur- 
face layer of the soil, a like proportion of 
drawn ashes, or a two-hundredth part (or even 
less) of marl, are sufficient to modify the na- 
ture, change the products, and increase by one- 
half the crops of a soil destitute of the calca- 
reous principle. This principle, then, is 
necessary to be furnished to those soils which 
do not contain it ; it is then a kind of condi- 
ment disposed by nature to ameliorate poor 
soils, and to give to them fertility. 

Ancient Date of the Use of Lime. 

5. Lime, as it appears, has long ago been 
used in many countries. However, nothing 
proves that its efiect was well known to the 
Greeks and Romans, the then civilized por- 
tion of mankind. Their old agricultural 
writers do not speak of the use of lime on 
cultivated lands, nor on meadows. Pliny, 
the naturalist, tells us, however, that it was in 
use for vines, for olives, and for cheny trees, 
the fruit of which it made more forward : and he 
speaks of its being used on the soil generally 



12 



in two provincts of Gaul, those of the Pic- 
tones i\n(l ^dui,* whose fields lime rendered 
more fruitful. The agriculture of the barba- 
rians was tlieui in this particular, more ad- 
vanced than that of the Uoinnns. After that, 
all trace of the use of lime in agriculture is 
lost for a long time — whether because it had 
ceased to be used, or only because the no- 
tice of it was omitted by writers on agricul- 
ture. The trace is again recovered with 
Bernard Pellissy, who recommends the use 
of it in compost in moist lands, and speaks of 
his use of it in the Ardennes. Nearly a cen- 
tury later, Olivier de Serresf advises its em- 
ployment in the same manner, and reports 
that they made use of it in the provinces of 
Gueldres and Juliers [in Belgium]. He 
makes no mention of its use in France : but 
as (he practices of ngriculture were not then 
much brought together, and were but little 
known, it may be believed that at that time 
Flanders, Belgium, and Normandy, made 
use of lime. 

In England, liming seems to have been in 
use earlier and more generally than in France, 
but then, and ever since, good agricultural 
practices have remained in the particular 
countries where they were established, without 
being spread abroad. Now, novelties carry 
no alarm with them — and within the last 
twenty years liming has made more progress 
than in the two preceding centuries. 

Of Soils suitable for Liming. 

6. Lime, as has been said before, suits 
such soils as do not contain it already. To 
distinguish these soils from others, chemical 
analysis is, without doiib*, the surest means ; 
but it offers often too nmny difficulties, and 
lime may be met with in a soil in proportion 
great enough to exert its power on vegetation 
without producing cflervescence with acids.J 
But visible characters may furnish indications 
almost certain. The soils where the cow 
wheat, \^melampi]re,1 rest-harrow, '[I'ononis, 
ou arrele-Lccuf,^ thistles, colt's foot, [<t<s«i- 
lage,'] and red poppy, spring spontaneously — 
which produce well in wheat, legumes, (or 
plants of the pea kind,) and especially sain- 
foin — where the chestnut succeeds badly — 
which shows but little of dog's-tooth, [c/tte»i- 
</«»/,] volunteer grasses, or common weeds, 
l^gramincs adveulices^ except of the small le- 



• JEdui et Piclonfs calee uberrimos feccre ugrns. 

t Who wrote on Agriciillure in tlio rtign of Henry 
IV. of France. Tr. 

i This is a full thoiigli hulircct arlmission of tlie 
truth of the doctrine of neiUnil soils, muintained in the 
Easay on Calcareous Manures. Tr. 



guminous kinds — soils which, after being 
dry, crumble with the first rain — all these 
are almost certainly calcareous, have no need 
of lime, nor its compounds,* and would feel 
from their use rather ill than good elfects. 

On the contrary, all soils composed of the 
mouldcrings [r/cbris] of granite or schistus, 
almost all sandy soils ; those which are moist 
and cold of the iuunense argilo-silicious table 
lands \^j)lalcaui argih-silicituj:^ which sepa- 
rate the basins of great rivers ;t those where 
rushes, f[pelil ajmtc^ the heath, /fs ;)e/i7»carej: 
blaitcs, the whitish moss spring spontaneous- 
ly — almost all the soils infested with aruine a 
chaptkts, wilh dog's-tooth, with bent grass, 
[agresiis,^ red sorrel, and the little fever- 
few — that soil where, unless so clayey as to 
offer great difficulty to cultivation, only rye, 
potatoes, and buckwheat, can be made to 
grow, and m here sainfoin and the greater part 
of the crops of commerce cannot succeed — 
where, however, trees of all descriptions, and 
especially of the resinous kinds, the wood- 
pine, the sea pine, the larch, the northern 
pine, and the chestnut, thrive better than in 
the best land — all these soils are without the 
calcareous principle, and all the improving 
manures in wliich it is found, would give to 

♦ Though hoth the tnitli and the usefulness of this 
passage, in general, are ailiuitted, yet it is incorrect in 
the position that none of llie " eoiunounds of lime'* 
would he advantageously employed on calcareous 
soils. On the contrary, the sulphate of lime (gjpsum), 
the most important compound as a manure next to 
the carbonate, is most ttToctive where the land has 
lime in some other form : and indeed, (as has been 
maintained elsewhere,) it seems generally inert and 
useless on soils very deficient in lime. [Essay on 
Calcareous Manures, pp. 50, 92.] 

t The character oi" the lands called by the author 
" pMtaiix ttTt^ilu-silkieiix," and which he refers to fre- 
(pifinlly in the course of his essay, can only be gather- 
ed from the conte.xt. They are |>oor, intractable under 
tillage, and hut little pervious to water. The name 
indicates then- coniposilinn to be siliceous and alumi- 
nous earth almost entirely. It may be inferred that 
such liinds resemble in sod the elevated level ridgeSf 
which in lower Virgii.ia separate dllTerent watercours- 
es, and especially those which, in addition to being 
miserably poor, arc remarkably close, stiff", and " wa- 
ter-holdiuir," and arc in some places called "cold 
livery hmd," " pipe-clay," or " cray-fish" soils. Soil of 
this kind, and ofthc nrost marked character, is partieu- 
iaily descnbod at page 4(t, E^say on Calcareous Ma- 
nures, 2d ed. M. IPuvis elsewhere speaks of this 
orgilo-silieieux" soil as beiiig found every where in 
l^'rimce, and as known in difTLTcnt places under the va- 
rious names of "terrain blanc," "blanche terrc," in 
the south, " boulbenne," in the north, of " terrecly- 
tre," and " terre a bois" — and the basin of tlic Loire, 
"tcrre dc Sologne." The last name would direct us 
to the lands of Sologne, which furnish it, as it may bo 
presumed, as being of like quality. Arthur Young 
says, " Sologne is one of the poorest and most unim- 
proved provinces of the kingdom, and one of the most 
singular coimliies 1 have seen. It is flat, consisting of 
a poor sand or gravel, everywhere on a clay or marl 
bottom, retcniivi; of water to such a degree tiiat every 
ditch and liolo was full of iU" Tn. 



13 



these the qualities of, and nourish the growths 
peculiar to, calcareous soils. 

But there, more than elsewhere, it is espe- 
cially necessary to avoid too much haste. 
Liming upon a large scale ought not to be 
done, until after having succeeded in small ex- 
periments oil many different parts of the 
ground designed to be improved. 

Extent of Surface to which Lime is suitable. 

7. A great proportion of the soil of France 
does not contain the calcareous principle. 
The country of primitive formation — the 
mountains of which the rock is not calca- 
reous — many soils even, of which the sub- 
soils inclose calcareous formations — the 
great and last alluvion which has covered the 
surface, and which still composes it where- 
ever the return waters have not carried it off 
with them — also extensive surfaces, in the 
composition of which the calcareous princi- 
ple had not entered except in small propor- 
tions, and which small amount has been 
worn out by the successions of vegetation — 
all these kinds of soil, which comprise at 
least three-fourths of the surface of France, 
to be fertilized, demand calcareous manures. 
If it is admitted that one-third of all this 
space has already received aid from lime, 
marl, ashes of wood, or of peat, of bones 
burnt, or pounded, there will still remain the 
half of France to be improved by such 
means ; an immense task, doubtless — but of 
which the results will be still more prodigious, 
since it will cause the products of all this 
great space to^be increased one-half, or more. 

Of the various Modes of apphjing Lime to 
the Soil. 

8. Three principal modes of proceeding are 
in use for applying lime. The first is the 
most simple, and is the most general where- 
ever lime is obtained cheaply, and where cul- 
ture is but little advanced in perfection, and 
manual labor is dear. This consists in putting 
the lime [the burned limestone] immediately 
on the ground in little heaps at 20 feet ave- 
rage distance, and each heap containing, ac- 
cording to the rate of limiting, from a cubic 
foot of the stone to half that quantity. When 
the lime has been slaked by exposure to the 
air, and has fallen into powder, it is spread on 
the surface so as to be equally divided. 

9. The second mode differs from the first 
in this respect : the heaps of stone are co- 
vered with a coat of earth, about six inches 
thick, according to the size of the heap, and 
which is equal to five or six times the bulk of 
the hme. 'When tlie hme begins to swell, by 



slaldng, the cracks and openings in the heap 
are filled with earth : and when the lime is 
reduced to powder, each heap is worked 
over, so as to mix thoroughly the lime and the 
earth. If nothing hurries the labor, this last 
operation is repeated at the end of fifteen 
days — and then, after waiting two weeks more, 
the mixture is spread over the soil. 

10. The third process, which is adopted 
where culture is more perfect, where lime is 
dear, and which combines all the advantages 
of liming without oflering any of their incon- 
veniences, consists in making compost heaps 
of lime and earth, or mould. For this, there 
is first made a bed of earth, mould, or turf, of 
a foot, or thereabouts, in thickness. The 
clods are chopped down, and there is spread 
over a layer of unslaked hme of a hecto- 
litre* for the 20 cubic feet, or a ton to the 
45 cubic feet of earth. Upon this lime 
there is placed another layer of earth, equal 
in thickness to the first, then a second layer 
of lime ; and then the heap is finished by a 
third layer of earth. If the earth is moist, 
and the lime recently burned, 8 or 10 days 
will suffice to slake it completely. Then the 
heap is cut down and well mixed — and this 
operation is repeated afterwards before using 
the manure, which is delayed as long as pos- 
sible, because the power of the effect on the 
soil is increased with the age of the compost ; 
and especially if it has been made with the 
earth containing much vegetable mould. 
This method is the one most used in Bel- 
gium and Flanders : it is becoming almost 
the exclusive practice in Normandy : it is the 
only practice, and followed with the greatest 
success, in La Sarthe. Lime in compost is 
never injurious to the soil. It carries with it 
the surplus of alimentary manure which the 
surplus of product demands for its suste- 
nance. Light soils, sandy or gravelly, are 
not tired by repetitions of this compost. No 
country, nor author, charges lime, used in this 
state, with having been injurious to the soil. 
In short, this means seems to us the most 
sure, the most useful, and the least expen- 
sive mode of applying lime as manure. 

11. The reduction of burnt lime to pow- 
der by means of a momentary immersion in 
water in handle-baskets, serves much to has- 
ten the slaking, whether the lime is to be ap- 
plied immediately to the soil, or in compost 
heaps — some hours in this manner sufficing, 
in place of waiting two weeks ; however, the 

* The hectolitre contains 6102.8 English cubic inch- 
es, or is equal to 2.82, (or about 2.G-7) Winche.ster 
bushel?, Therofoie the hectolitre is rather more in 
proportion to the hectare, than our bushel is to the 
acre. The decalitre (named next page) is the tenth 
of a hectolitre, and of course the " double decalitre" 
is the tit'tli. Tr. 



14 



effect of lime, in this state, may well be diffe- 
rent, as we have then the hydrate of lime, and 
less ofthe carbonate of caustic lime.* If great 
rains follow, this process is not without its in- 
conveniences, because then the lime, which 
is already saturated with water, is more easily 
brought to the state of mortar, which ought 
to be avoided more than every other injury to 
the manure. 

The reduction of burnt limestone to pow- 
der, whether it be spontaneous or by immer- 
sion, produces in the compost a bulk greater 
by one-half or more than that of the stone — 
10 cubic feet, producing 15 — or a ton, 10 
cubic feet. This increase is not uniform 
with all kinds of lime ; it is greater with the rich 
[_gi-asses2, and less with the poor varieties. 

Liming, aa praclisf din different Countries. 
Jn the Department of Ain. 

12. The application of lime in Ain dates 
fifty years back. At the present time, the 
soil which has been limed is still more pro- 
ductive than the neighboring, not limed. 
Nevertheless, liming is but beginning to ex- 
tend, while marling, which was begun fifteen 
years later, has already covered many thou- 
sands of hectares. This is because marling 
is an operation within the means of poor cul- 
tivators, being accomplished by labor alone ; 
while liming requires considerable advances, 
especially in this country, where lime is dear, 
and the dose given is heavy. 

The dressings vary in quantity, from 60 
to 100 hectolitres the hectare, according to 
the. nature of the ground, and often accord- 
ing to the caprice of the cultivators. Al- 
though these limings have not been m.ide 
with all the care and economy that was desir- 
able, they have been very efficacious when 
the soil has been sufliciently drained. The 
following tables, extracted from the registers 
of three contiguous domains, belonging to 
M. Armand, three years before, and nine 
years during the progress of liming, give us 
the means of appreciating the results. The 
quantities of seed and of crops, are calculat- 
ed in double decalitres, or in measures of 
fiflhs of hectolitres. 



♦ An incorrect expression, certainly, but literally 
translated. Tr. 



Tahl* of product of the domain of La Croi- 
selle. 



TBA^RS. 


kVE. 


WUCAT. 1 


Seed. 


Product. 


Seed. 


Product. 


1822 
1823 
1824 
1825 
1826 
1827 
1828 
1829 
1830 
1831 
1832 
1833 


110 

110 

110 

107 

106 

100 

90 

82 

60 

78 

55 

61 


600 
764 
744 
406 
578 
604 
634 
538 
307 
350 
478 
529 


24 
24 
24 
27 

28 
30 
36 
48 
60 
40 
68 
62 


146 
136 
166 
251 
210 
249 
391 
309 
469 
417 
816 
■ 546 



Table of prodtict of the domain of Miseriat, 



YEARS. 


RTE. 


WHEAT. 1 


Seed. 


Product. 


Seed. 


Product. 


1822 


120 


487 


16 


100 


1823 


120 


708 


16 


103 


1824 


120 


644 


18 


84 


1825 


112 


504 


28 


228 


1826 


120 


677 


20 


116 


1827 


115 


694 


20 


162 


1828 


118 


726 


40 


328 


1829 


104 


566 


41 


277 


1830 


79 


298 


71 


477 


1S31 


91 


416 


43 


326 


1S32 


79 


411 


75 


786 


1833 


76 


616 


48 


361 



Table of product of the domain of La Ba^ 
ronne. 



VEARS. 


RYE. 


WHEAT. 1 


Seed. 


Product. 


Seed. 


Product. 


1822 


110 


605 


22 


180 


1823 


110 


643 


22 


138 


1824 


110 


662 


24 


149 


1825 


102 


398 


32 


252 


1826 


110 


612 


32 


187 


1827 


107 


546 


34 


204 


1828 


98 


696 


38 


343 


1829 


84 


608 


40 


268 


1830 


91 


389 


59 


374 


1831 


92 


411 


40 


295 


1832 


70 


512 


SO 


649 


1833 


75 


611 


61 


471 



15 



The application of 3000 hectolitres [8,490 
bushels] of lime, of the value of 6000 
francs [$1116] upon 32 hectares [80 acres] 
of ground, made successively during nine 
years, has then more than doubled the crops 
of winter grain, the seed being deducted. 
The other crops of the farms have received 
a proportional increase ; and the revenue of 
the proprietor, in doubling, has annually in- 
creased two-thirds more than the amount of 
the sum expended in the purchase of lime. 
Still, there is not yet half the arable land 
hraed, since of 66 hectares, only 32 have re- 
ceived this improvement. 

The products of 1834 are still greater than 
those of 1833. But these are sufficient to 
prove the importance and utility of applying 
lime to suitable soils. 

Many other examples sustain these re- 
sults ; and from them all it appears, that the 
wheat seedings are increased from double to 
triple — that the rye lands, from bringing four 
to five [to one of seed] in rye, are able to 
bring six to eight in wheat — and that other 
products are increased in proportion. The 
melioration then is, relatively, much greater 
upon bad ground than upon good, since it is 
two-thirds and more on the wheat land, and 
on the rye lands the crop is increased in va- 
lue three-fold. 

Flemish Liming. 

13. The use of calcareous manures in the 
department of the North, as in Belgium, ap- 
pears to be as old as good fanning. It is now 
much less frequent in Belgium. The an- 
cient and repeated limings have, as it seems, 
furnished to great part of the soil all that is 
necessary to it, for the present. But the de- 
partment of the North still receives lime, 
marl, or ashes, every where, or nearly so, 
where lime is not a component ingredient of 
the soil. They distinguish in this country 
two kinds of liming. The first [chaulage 
foncierl consists in giving to the soil, every 
10 or 12 years before seed time, four cubic 
metres, or 40 hectolitres of lime to the hec- 
tare.* They often mix with the slaked lime, 
ashes of bituminous coal, or of peat, which 
enter into the mixture in the proportion of 
from a third to a half, and take the place of an 
equal quantity of hme. The other mode of 
liming [^chaulage (TassohmenQ, is given in 
compost, and at every renewal of the rota- 
tion, or upon the crop of spring grain. It is 
also in regular use in this country, still more 
than in Belgium, upon the meadows on eold 
pasture lands, which do not receive the wa- 

* 46 bnshels to the acre, English or American mea- 
sure. Tr. 



ters of irrigation. It warms the ground and 
increases and improves its products. The 
older the compost is, the greater its effect, 
which lasts from 15 to 20 years, at the end of 
which time the dressing is renewed. 

14. The limings of Normandy, the most 
ancient of France, are kept up in the neigh- 
borhood of Bayeux, while elsewhere they are 
forbidden in the leases : however, now they 
go over all the surface which has need of 
them ; but in place of being applied immedi- 
ately to the soil, as in the ancient method, the 
lime is almost always put in compost. 

Liming of La Sarthe. 

15. Of the modes of using lime, that of 
La Sarthe seems preferable. It is at once 
economical and productive, and secures the 
soil from all exhaustion. It is given every 
three years, at each renewal of the rotation, 
in the average quantity of 10 hectolitres to 
the hectare,* in compost made in advance, 
with seven or eight parts of mould, or of 
good earfti, to one of lime. They use this 
compost on the land for the autumn sowing, 
and placed alternately with rows of farm- 
yard manure. This method, of which the 
success is greater from day to day, is ex- 
tending on the great body of flat argilo-sili- 
cious lands, which border the Loire'; and it 
would seem that this method ought to be 
adopted every where, on open soils that per- 
mit surplus water to drain off easily. — On 
very moist soils the dose of lime ought per- 
haps to be increased. 

We would desire much to inculcate with 
force the suitableness, and eminent advanta- 
ges, of using at the same time lime and [ali- 
mentary] manure. Here they do better still, in 
using at the same time a compost of lime 
with earth and dung. In addition, during the 
half century that the Manceaux have been 
liming, the productiveness of the soil has not 
ceased to increase. 

16. The countries of which we have spo- 
ken, are those of France in which liming is 
most general. However, more than half the 
departments, I think, have commenced the 
use, and in a sixth, or nearly, it seems to be 
established. Doubtless, the first trials do 
not succeed every where. There is required 
a rare combination of conditions for new ex- 
periments, even when they have succeeded, 
to induce their imitation by the great mass. 
Still, successful results are multiplied, and 
become the centres of impulse, from which 
meliorations extend. 



' 1 1 J bushels to the acre. Tb. 



IG 



English Liming. 

17. The English limings seem to bo csla- 
blished upon quite another principle from that 
of France. They arc given with such pro- 
digality, that the melioration upon the limed 
soil has no need to be renewed afterwards. 
VVliilst in France wo are content to give from 
a thousandth to a hundredth of lime to the 
tillable soil, from 10 to 100 hectolitres to the 
hectare, they give in England from one to 
six hundredths, or from 100 to 600 hectolitres 
the hectare. The full success of the me- 
tliod of our country might make us regard 
the English method as an unnecessary waste. 
It seems that they sacrifice a capital live, six, 
ten times greater, without obtaining from it a 
result much superior ; and that without la- 
vishing [alimentary] manures also afterwards, 
the future value of the sod would be endan- 
gered in the hands of a greedy cultivator. 

We will not urge the condemnation of a 
practice which seems to have resulted in 
few inconveniencics. The abundance of ali- 
nicntaiy manures which the English farmer 
gives to his [limed] soils, has guarded against 
exhaustion : and then, in very moist ground, 
they have doubtless, by the very heavy liming, 
made the soil healthy, and its nature seems 
modified for a long time to come ; and such 
kinds, ahd where humtts abounds, will take up 
a heavy dose of lime, and, as it seems, al- 
ways without inconvenient consequences ; 
there is then formed there the humaU of lime 
in the greatest proportion, and we shall see 
that this combination is a great means of pro- 
ductiveness in the soil.* 

Surface Liming. 

18. In Germany, where liming and marl- 
ing, like most other agricultural improve- 
ments, have recently made great advances, 
besides the ordinary modes of application, 
lime is used as a surface dressing. They 
sprinkle over tho rye, in the spring, a com- 
post containing 8 to 10 hectolitres of lime to 
the hectare, fifteen days after having sown 
clover. Also on the clover of the preceding 
year, they apply lime in powder, which has 
been slaked in the water of a dunghill, the 

* In this passage the author distinctly affirms the 
tnitli of the chemical combination in the soil of calca- 
reous and vegetable (or otlier putrescent) — or t!ie 
power of calcareous earlii to tix and retain enriching 
matter — wliich is mnintaiiicd in the Essay on Cn/co- 
rcoits manures, (pp. 30, 31,) to be the most important 
action of calcareous matter as an ingredient of soil. — 
Still M. Puvis seems to attach mucii less importance 
to this than to other agencies of lime, which are con- 
aidered in the Essay as of little value in comparison. 
Tb. 



dose being less by one-half ; the efTsct upon 
the clover and the following crop of wheat is 
very advantageous. 

In Flanders, where they use lime mixed 
with ashes, it is especially applied to mea- 
dows, natural or artificial, and tlie application 
b then made on the surface. 

Burning Lime. 

19. The burning of lime is performed with 
wood, « ith pit coal, or with peat ; in tempo- 
rary kilns, or furnaces, in permanent, or in 
perpetual kilns. It is burned in many places 
most economically with coal, but it is not so 
good a manure as the lime burned with wood, 
because, as it seems, of the potash contained 
in the latter case. There are but few places 
in which peat is used for this purpose ; how- 
ever, in Prussia they succeed with three- 
fourths peat and one-fourth wood. It is, 
doubtless, a very economical process, and the 
Sociele d' Enconragemenl has given in its 
transactions plans of peat kilns ; but I know 
not whether the operators who received prizes 
for their use have continued the practice. 

Temporary kilns admit of the burning of a 
great quantity of lime ; but the permanent 
kilns burn it with most economy of fuel. In 
the first, 5 quintals of wood burn 4 quintals, 
or 1 ton, or 2i hectolitres of lime — and in the 
others, the same quantity of wood will suffice 
for 6 quintals or 3j hectolitres. But in the 
permanent kilns such is the expense of con- 
struction and repairs, that they cannot be jus- 
tified except when kept in frequent use. 
Coal burns from three to four times its bulk 
of lime — the shape of the kiln, the kind of 
limestone, and that of the coal, making the 
diflerenco. Hydraulic hme is calcined more 
easily than the common [cliaux grasses']. 
Egg-shaped kilns for coal seem to be prefer- 
able to the conical, which are more generally 
met with. 

Precautions to he used in Liming. 

20. Whatever may be the method adopted 
for using lime, it is essential that, like all cal- 
careous manures, it should be a|)plied in pow- 
der, and not in a state like mortar — and upon 
the earth when not wet. Until the lime is co- 
vered up finally, all rain upon it ought to be 
avoided, which reduces it to paste or to clots : 
and this injures its effect greatly, and even 
more than reasoning can explain. It ought not 
to be placed except upon soil.the surface mould 
of which drains itself naturally [by permitting 
the water to pass through.] On a marshy 
soil, unless the upper layer has been well- 
dried, or in a very moist soil, from which tho 



17 



surface water does not sink or pass off easily, 
the properties of lime remain as it were lock- 
ed up, and do not make themselves seen, un- 
til, by new operations, the vegetable mould 
has been drained and put in healthy condi- 
tion. 

On an argillaceous and very moist soil, the 
use of marl, which is applied in great quan- 
tities, is preferable to that of lime, because it 
can have a more powerful effect in giving the 
deficient health to the surface mould. On 
soil of this kind, a deep ploughing is a pre- 
liminary condition, essential to the success of 
either liming or marling : because in increas- 
ing the depth of the tilled soil, we increase 
also the means of putting the surface into 
healthy condition. 

21. To secure the effect of lime on the 
first crop, it ought to be mixed with the soil 
some time before the sowing of the crop : 
however, if it is used in compost, it is suffi- 
cient that the compost be made a long time 
previously. 

Lime, whether alone or in compost, 
spread dry upon the soil, ought to be covered 
by a very shallow first ploughing, preceded 
by a slight harrowing, in order that the hme, 
in the course of tillage, may remain always, 
as much as possible, placed in the midst of 
the vegetable mould. 

Lime, reduced to the smallest particles, 
tends to sink into the soil. It glides between 
small particles of sand and of clay, and de- 
scends below the sphere of the nutrition of 
plants, and stops under the ploughed layer of 
soil : and when there in abundance, it forms 
by its combinations a kind of floor, which ar- 
rests the sinking water, and greatly injures 
the crops. This is an inconvenience of lime 
applied in heavy doses, and is hastened by 
deep ploughing. 

Various qualities of Lime. 

22. It is necessary for the farmer to know 
the nature of the lime which he uses. It may 
be pure, or mixed with silex, clay, or magne- 
sia. Pwe lime is the most economical, the 
most active, that which can produce the most 
effect in the least quantity. 

Siliciotis limestone is used in greater quan- 
tity. The lime from it receives, as does the 
foregoing, the name of hoi lime, and there is 
little difference in the application, except that 
more of the latter is wanting. 

Argillaceous lime is the same as the hy- 
draulic lime, or the poor lime of builders. 
It appears that the first two kinds are more 
favorable to forming grain, while the latter 
favors more the growth of straw, grasses, 
and leguminous crops. It is better for the 



improvement of the soil, but a heavier dose 
of it is required. 

Magnesian lime acts very powerfully, but 
exhausts the soil if given in a large dose, or 
if it is not followed by alimentary manure in 
abundance. It has exhausted some districts 
in England, and entire provinces of Ameri« 
ca,* and it is to this kind that seem due most 
of the complaints made against lime. 

By chemical processes the farmer may 
make himself sure of the nature of the lime 
which he uses. 

Pure lime is commonly white, and is dis- 
solved, without any thing being left, in nitric 
or muriatic acid. 

Silicious lime is often gray, and leaves a 
sandy residue [after solution], which is rough 
to the touch. 

Argillaceous lime is obtained from stones 
which have a clayey odor and appearance : 
it is commonly yellow ; and leaves, after the 
solution, a residue which is mostly an impal- 
pable powder [e< qui prend en masse^, which 
may be formed into a mass when wet. 

Magnesian lime is made from stone com- 
monly colored brown or pale yellow ; it forms 
a white cloud in nitric acid, diluted with wa- 
ter, and used in less quantity than sufficient 
for saturation. 

Of second Limings. 

23. When the limed field returns to the 
state in which it was before the operation, 
when the same weeds re-appear, and the 
crops lower in product, it is time to renew 
the application of lime. It may be conceived 
that the time of the second liming depends on 
the amount given in the first. When the 
dressing has been light, it is necessary, as 
is done by the Flemings and the Manceaux, 
to recommence entirely, or to the extent of 
the first dressing : when it has been heavy, 
the next may be diminished by one-half. Be- 
sides, in this matter we should take counsel 
of the state of the soil and of experience, 
because there are some lands which de- 
mand, and can use heavier doses of lime thaq 
others. 

Quantities applied. 

24. The quantities of first as of second 
dressings of lime, vary with the consistence 

* The author has been deceived by exaggerated ac- 
counts of injury fiom liming in America. It is proba- 
ble that wherever it occurred, it was caused by the 
usual ignorance of the action of lime : from errone- 
ously considering it as alimentary, and directly ferti- 
lizing manure, and after applying it, wealing out the 
soil by continued grain crops. Such efTects are spok- 
en of by Eordley. Tn. 



J8 



of soils : they ought to be small on light and 
sandy soils — and may, without ill conse- 
quences, be heavy on clay soils. 

The dose ought to vary according as the 
soil is more or less pervious to water, or as 
drained well or ill by its texture. Small ap- 
plications to soils from which the superfluous 
water does nut pass easily, are but little felt ; 
but if the dressing is heavy, and the plough- 
ing deep, the lime aids the draining and adds 
to the healthy state of the soil. It may be 
conceived that the quantity of lime ought also 
to be increased with the annual quantity of 
rain that falls — because in proportion to that 
quantity ought the openness of the soil, and 
its fitness for draining, to be extended. 

Nevertheless, the practices of the depart- 
ments of the North and of La Sarthe seem 
to indicate the average dressing which suits 
in general for land : thus the liming of the 
North, which every ten or twelve years gives 
to the soil 40 hectolitres of lime to the hec- 
tare, or a little more than three hectolitres a 
year, agrees with that of La Sarthe, which 
gives eight or ten hectolitres every three 
years. The first plan gives at one dressing 
what the other distributes in four : as both 
make alike average, it may be thence inferred 
that the earth demands annually three hectoli- 
tres, [323 bushels to the acre,] to sustain its 
fecundity. But as neither the soil nor the 
plants consume all this quantity of lime, it is 
to b« believed, that at the end of a greater or 
less length of time, the soil will have received 
enough to have no more need of it for a cer- 
tain space of time. 

J\Ianner of treating Limed Lands. 

25. After having, by liming, given the soil 
a great productive power, having put it in 
condition to produce the most valuable crops, 
which are often also the most exhausting, it 
is necessary to husband these resources — to 
give manure in return for the products obtain- 
ed — to employ as litter, and not as food, the 
straw, now increased by one half — to raise 
grass crops from the soil now fitted to bear 
them with advantage — in short, to modify the 
general plan, and the detail of the culture ac- 
cording to the new powers of the soil, the 
prices of commodities, and to local conve- 
niences. 

However, it is not necessary to hurry the 
change of the rotation. Such an operation 
is long, ditficult, very expensive, and ought 
not to be executed but with much delibera- 
tion. 

Effects of Lime on the Soil. 

26. The effects of lime, although similar 
to, are not identical with, those produced by 



marl ; and the qtialities of soils limed, differ 
in some points from those of natural calca- 
reous soils. The grain from limed land is 
rounder, firmer, gives less bran, and more 
flour, than that from marled land : the grain of 
marled land is more gray, gives more bran, 
and resembles that made upon clover, though 
it may be preferable to the latter. The grain 
of a limed soil is more like that from land 
improved with drawn ashes. Limed land is 
less exposed to danger from drought than 
marled land, on soils naturally calcareous. 
The crop is not subject to be lodged at flow- 
ering time, when the sowing was done in dry 
earth. 

27. In limed earth, weeds and insects dis- 
appear. The earth, if too light, acquires stifT- 
ness, and is lightened if too clayey. The 
surface of the argilo-silicious soil, before close 
and whitish, is made friable, and becomes 
reddish, as if rotten : it hardens and splits 
with drought, and is dissolved by the rains 
which succeed. This spontaneous loosening 
of the soil facilitates greatly the labor of the 
cultivator, the movement of the roots of the 
growing plants, and the reciprocal action of 
the atmosphere upon the soil, which remains 
open to its influence. 

All these new properties which the limed 
soil has acquired, doubtless explain in part 
the fertilizing means which calcareous agents 
bring to the soil : but we think it is still neces- 
sary to seek some of these causes elsewhere. 

28. Lime, according to the recent disco- 
veries of German chemists, seizes in the 
soil the soluble humus or humic acid, lakes 
it from all other bases, and forms a compound 
but slightly soluble, which appears, under this 
form, eminently suitable to the wants of plants. 
But as this compound is not soluble in less 
than 2000 times it weight of water, while 
without the lime the humus is soluble in a 
volume of water less by one-half, it would 
follow that, in consequence of lime, the con- 
sumption of this substance, and the produc- 
tive power of the soil would, in like propor- 
tion, be better preserved. Since the pro- 
ducts of the soil increase much from the 
liming, while the humus is economised, since 
these products borrow very little from the 
soil, which remains more fertile while thus 
yielding greater products, it follows that the 
pnncipal action of the lime consists, at first, 
in augmenting, in the soil and in the plants, 
the means of drawing from the atmosphere 
the vegetable principles which they find there ; 
and next, in aiding, according to the need, the 
formation, in the soil or the plants, the sub- 
stances which enter into the composition of 
plants, and which are not met with ready 
formed either in the atmosphere or in the soil. 



19 



The researches upon these various points 
are curious, important, interesting to practice 
as well as to science — and will lead us to ex- 
plain, by means not yet appreciated, the 
action of lime upon vegetation. 

Absorption by plants of the principles of the 
atmosphere, in the vegetation on uncultivated 
soils. 

29. Saussure has concluded, from his ex- 
periments, that plants derive from the soil 
about one-twentieth of their substance ; and 
the experiments of Van Helmontand of Boyle 
have proved that considerable vegetable pro- 
ducts diminish very little the mass of the soil. 
But this fact is still better proved by the ob- 
servation of what passes in uncultivated soils. 

Woodland that is cut over in regular suc- 
cession {taillis) produces almost indefinitely, 
without being exhausted, and even becoming 
richer, the mass of vegetable products which 
man gathers and removes, and of which the 
soil does not contain the principles. If, in- 
stead of woodlands thus partially and suc- 
cessively cut over, we consider upon the 
same soil a succession of forests, and, for 
greater ease of estimation, resinous forests, 
we find for the products of the generation of 
an age, forty to fifty thousand cubic feet to the 
hectare. This product is less than that of 
the resinous forests of many parts of the 
country, and yet it is nearly equal in bulk to 
half of the layer of the productive soil itself : 
it represents an annual increase of 24,000 
weight of wood to the hectare — and which is 
produced not only without impoverishing, but 
even while enriching the soil, by an enormous 
quantity of droppings and remains of all kinds. 

These products which do not come from 
the soil, are then drawn from the atmosphere, 
in which plants gather them by means of par- 
ticular organs designed for that use. These 
organs are the myriads of leaves which large 
vegetables bear — aerial roots, which gather 
these principles either ready formed in the 
air, or which take up there the elements, to 
combine them by means of vegetable power. 
But these aerial roots exert quite a different 
and superior energy in gathering the consti- 
tuent principles of plants in the atmosphere, to 
that of the roots in the ground — since the for- 
mer furnish nearly the whole amount of the 
vegetable mass, while the latter draw but very 
little from the soil. 

30. Plants may well find in the atmosphere 
the greater part of the volatile principles 
which compose them — the carbon, hydrogen, 
oxygen, and azote. But it is not so easily 
seen whence they obtain the fixed principles 



of which their ashes are composed. These 
products could not exist ready formed in the 
soil — for the saline principles contained in the 
ashes of a generation of great trees, which 
would amount to more than 25,000 weight to 
the hectare, would have rendered the soil ab- 
solutely barren, since, according to the experi- 
ments of M. Lecoq of Clermont, the twentieth 
part of this quantity is enough to make a soil 
sterile. We would find a similar result in ac- 
cumulating the successive products of an 
acre of good meadow. It is then completely 
proved that the saline principles of plants do 
not exist ready formed in the soil. They are 
no more formed in the atmosphere, or the 
the analyses of chemists would have found 
them there. However, as the intimate com- 
position of these substances is not yet per- 
fectly known, their elements may exist in the 
atmosphere, or even in the soil, among the 
substances which compose them. 

Neither can it be said that these salts may 
be derived from the atomic dust which floats 
in the air ; for this dust is composed of frag- 
ments organic and inorganic, carried especial- 
ly to the plants themselves, and then, in es- 
timating this atomic matter at the most, we 
will scarcely find in it the hundredth part of 
the saline substances contained in the vegeta- 
ble mass produced. We ought then to con- 
clude that the saline substances of plants are 
formed by the powers of vegetation or of the 
soil. 

31. In like manner as with the saline prin- 
ciples, the lime and the phosphates which are 
formed in ashes ought to be due to the same 
forces, whether the roots take up their unper- 
ceived elements in the soil, or the leaves gather 
them in the atmosphere. This consequence 
results evidently from this fact — that plants 
grown in soils, of which the analysis shows 
neither lime nor the phosphates, contain them 
notwithstanding in large proportion in their 
fixed principles — of which [or of the ashes] 
they often compose half the mass.* 

Absorption of plants, in vegetation on culti- 
vated soils. 

32. Vegetation on uncultivated soils ope- 
rates under conditions altogether different 
from those of the cultivated, so that the results 
receive modifications which it is important to 
examine. 

Nature produces, and continues to produce, 
all the vegetable mass in spontaneous growth, 



" This fact is explained very different by the Es- 
say on Calcareous Manures (Ch. VII.) where it is 
used to sustain tlie doctrine of neutral soils. — [Tr.] 



without any other condition than the alternation 
and succession of the species. Id vegeta- 
tion on cultivated land, by bringing together 
the same individual plants which are to grow 
abundantly on a soil and in a climate which, 
in most cases, are not those which nature had 
designed, there are required, besides the ge- 
neral condition ofalternation of the species, fre- 
quent tillage of the soil, and means to repair 
its losses, that the culture may be productive 
and be continued. However, with these new 
conditions, the force of absorption of plants 
on the atmosphere still furnishes the greater 
part of the vegetable principles in soils not 
limed — and still more in limed soils. 

To form a precise idea, we will take it in 
the land of the writer, its culture and its bien- 
nial rotation. As the same qualities of soil 
are found elsewhere, as no particular circum- 
stance increases or impairs its products, there 
would be found similar results, for the same 
qualities of soil, with a different culture. — 
The inferences which we will draw from ours 
will apply then to all others. 

On our soil of the third class, [or worst 
quality,] fallow returns every two years, with 
a biennial manuring of 120 quintals to the 
hectare. This mass contains more than four- 
fifths of water, which should not be counted 
as manure, and consequently the substance 
which serves for the reparation of the soil is 
reduced to 24 quintals. We reap, in rye, 
straw, and buckwheat, after the year of fal- 
low, a dry weight of 40 to 50 quintals on an 
average. If it is supposed that all the ma- 
nure is consumed, or employed in forming 
vegetable substance, still the soil would have 
furnished 18 to 20 quintals more than it re- 
ceived, and which excess would be due to the 
power of absorption, whether of the soil or of 
the plants, on the atmosphere. 

On land of middle quality, which yields a 
crop every year, with a double manuring, that 
is to say, of 48 quintals of dry manure, in two 
years there is a product of wheat, maize, or 
potatoes, which amounts to from 12 to 15,000 
weight, 120 to 150 quintals, of which two- 
thirds, or 80 quintals at least, are derived from 
absorption. 

On soils of good quality, with a manuring 
of one-third more than the last, which is equal 
to 64 quintals of the dry substance to the hec- 
tare, there are obtained of dry products, in 
grain, straw, roots, or hay, double of the last, 
or nearly so, of which three-fourtlis, or 180 
quintals, are due to the power of absorption. 

Lastly — upon the most fertile soils, {sols 
(Texceplion,) where manures are useless, the 
product, often double, or at least half as much 
more than the last-mentioned, will amount to 



360 quintals to the hectare in two years. 
This product would be, as in spontaneous 
vegetation, entirely due to absorption. 

We would have, then, to represent the pro- ^ 
ducts of two years, in quintals, in the four HI 
classes of soil under consideration, the pro- ^' 
gressive amounts of 42, 130, 240, 360 ; or, 
by deducting from these products the weight 
of the manure, we would have, to represent 
the power of absorption, the progression H 
18, 82, 176, 360 quintals. From this is de- ^ 
duced, as the first conclusion, that, suppos- 
ing the plants have consumed and annihilat- 
ed all the substance of the manure given, 
(which is beyond the truth,) plants receive a 
much greater part of their substance from the 
atmosphere than from the soil ; and that this 
power of drawing food from the atmosphere 
increases with the goodness of quality in soils. 

33. The proportion of fixed substances, 
or ashes, in agricultural products, is 43 lbs. to 
the 1000, and consequently, in our four class- 
es of land, the quantity amounts to 180, 559, 
1032, 1548 pounds. But the soluble saline 
substances form at least half of these ashes : 
they are then produced in the two years of 
the rotation, in the quantities of 90, 279, 516, 
774 pounds. But, according to Kirwan, barn 
yard manure yields 2 per cent, of soluble 
salts : then the manure given to these soils 
contained 48, 96 lbs. 128 of saline substances, 
which, being deducted from the preceding 
quantities, leave the four classes of soils stat- 
ed 42, 183, 388, 774 lbs. of products in so- 
luble salts, in two years of the rotation, gain- 
ed solely by the absorbing forces of the soil 
and of plants.* 

^34. But, in the same soils, with the same 
manures and the same tillage, by the addition 
to the thickness of the ploughed layer of only 
one-thousandth part of lime, the products, 
whether volatile or fixed, are increased in a 
striking manner : the soil of the first-named 
(or lowest) quality reaches the product of the 
second — the second rises one-half or more 
— and that of the best (of the manured soils) 
increases a fourth. Thus, our scale of pro- 
duct becomes 130,200,300 quintals — and de- 
ducting the manure, 106,152,236 quintals, 
for the two years of the rotation. The most 
fertile soil {sol d'exception) cannot receive 
lime beneficially, because it contains it alrea- 



♦ The proportions of ashes of different plants, and 
of their sahne matters, varj' greatly — and the uniform 
proportions assumed above, are tiir from correct, even 
as averages of unequal proportions. This will suf- 
ficiently appear from the following exarnpU s extract- 
ed front Saussure's tahle of the products of various 
vegetable substances. (Sec Davy's Ag. Chem. Lee 
III.) 



21 



dy ; these lands all belong to alluvions, where 
the calcareous principle has almost always 
been found in greater or less proportion. 

35. The product of fixed principles [as 
ashes] in the three classes of limed soils, 
would be 559,868,1290 pounds, and in solu- 
ble salts 278,430,645 pounds ; and, deduct- 
ing the soluble salts of the manure, the quan- 
tities would be 230,334,525. A light addi- 
tion of lime has then doubled the force of ab- 
sorption, and almost tripled the quantity of sa- 
line principles produced. One of the most 
remarkable effects of lime consists then, in 
making a soil produce a much greater propor- 
tion of saline principles : and if the experi- 
ments of M. Lecoq upon the efficacy of sa- 
line substances on vegetation are to be ad- 
mitted, it would be in part to the phenomenon 
of their production that lime would owe its 
fertilizing effect. 

36. It results from what precedes, that salts 
are formed in the soil or in vegetables : thus 
we see every day the nitrates of potash and 
of lime form under our eyes in the soil, or 
elsewhere, without any thing indicating to us 



Constituents of 100 parts of ashes. 



Names of Plants. 2 

£ 



<! OT H y 



AVheat, in flower 


, — 43,25 


12,75 0,25 32 0,5 


12,25 


Do. seeds ripe 


1—11 


15 0,25 54 1 


18,75 


Do. seeds ripe, 


33 10 


11,75 0,25 51 0,75 


23 


Straw of wheat, 


43 22,.5 


6,2 1 61,5 1 


78 


Seeds of do. 


13 47,16 44,5 0,5 0,25 


7,6 


Bran, 


52 4,16 46,5 0,5 0.25 


8,6 


Plants of maize, : 


122 69 


5,75 0,25 7,5 0,25 


17,25 


(Indian corn,) i 


% 






month before 








flowering. 








Do. in flower, 


81 69 


[6 0,25 7,5 0,25 


17 


Do. seed ripe. 


46 






Stalks of do. 


84 72,45 5 I IS 0,5 


3,05 


Spikes (tassels,) 


16 






of do. 








Seeds of do. 


10 62 


36 1 0,12 


0,88 


Oats (entire plant) 


,31 1 


24 60 0,25 


14,75 



The proportion of soluble salts, 2 percent, found by 
Kirwan in barn-yard manure, however correclly as- 
certained in a particular case, can no more be relied 
on as a fixed and uniform proportion, or even a true 
general average, as used by M. Puvis in the estimates 
above. ITr.] 



the origin of the potash which is contained. 
But potash itself again forms spontaneously 
in drawn ashes, according to the observations 
of the chemist Gelhen. We see salts also 
renewed in the artificial nitre beds, with the 
aid of moisture and exposure to the air. But 
it is the presence of lime that determines this 
formation more particularly. The nitrates 
abound in the ruins of demolished edifices ; 
they are formed in the walls, and in all parts 
of houses situated in damp places ; they ef- 
floresce on the buildings of chalk in Cham- 
pagne ; they are produced spontaneously in 
the ploughed lands of the kingdom of Mur- 
cia. This effect, which we see that the cal- 
careous principle produces every where, we 
think it produces in all the soils to which it is 
given, and where meet the circumstances 
which favour the formation of nitrates, viz : 
humidity, vegetable mould, and exposure to 
the air. But, according to the experiments 
of M. Lecoq and others, and the opinion 
which is established of the old agriculturists, 
the nitrates are the most fertilizing salts. It 
would be then to their formation, which it pro- 
motes in the soil, that lime owes, in part, its 
effect on vegetation. 

37. The foregoing proofs of the daily for- 
mation in the soil, and by vegetable life, of 
saline and earthy compounds, taken in nature 
and on a great scale, are doubtless sufficient : 
but they may still be supported by the experi- 
ments and opinions of able men who have 
adopted the same system. 

And first — in the e.xperiment of Van Hel- 
mont, in five years, a willow of five pounds 
grew to weigh 169, and had caused a loss of 
only two ounces to the soil which bore it. 
But the 164 pounds which the willow had 
taken contained five pounds of ashes, which 
are due enfirely to absorption, since the 
leaves and the other droppings of five years, 
which were not saved, would have given at 
least one pound of ashes, which makes up 
for, besides all that which, in spite of the sheet 
of lead which covered the top of the vessel 
in which the willow grew, it might have re- 
ceived in the waterings, and from other for- 
tuitous circumstances. Boyle has repeated 
and confirmed this experiment in all its 
parts. 

Lampadius, in diflierent isolated compart- 
ments, some filled with aluraine, others with 
silex, others with [carbonate of) lime, all 
pure, has made plants to grow, of which the 
burning has yielded to analysis like results ; 
and which, consequently, contained earths 
which were not in the soils which bore them. 

Saussure, in establishing that plants do not 
take in the soil more than a twentieth of their 



n 



aubstancoi id extract of mould and in carbonic 
acid, has necessaril)' established, by the same 
means, that almost the whole amount of fixed 
principles do not proceed from the soil. 

Braconnot has analyzed lichens, which 
contained more than half their weight of oxa- 
late of lime — and he has observed others co- 
vered with crusts of carbonate of hme when 
there was none of this earth in the neighbor- 
hood. 

Shrader, in burning plants grown in sub- 
stances which did not contain any earthy 
principle, has found in their ashes, earths 
and salts which were neither in the seeds 
sown, nor in the pulverized matters in which 
the plants grew. 

Lastly — the analyses of Saussure, though 
showing more of the carbonate of lime in the 
ashes of plants which grew on calcareous 
soils than on soils not calcareous, yet, never- 
theless, they have formed more than a sixth 
of the ashes from vegetables on silicioiis 
soils — and Einhoff has found 65 per cent, 
of lime in the ashes of pines grown on sili- 
cious soil.* The labors of science then 
confirm what we have above established, that 
plants, or the soil, form salts and earths.f 

* It is presumed, from the context, that Ihcse sili- 
cious soils were not the least calcareous. — (Ed. F. R.) 

t Van Helmont's experiment, cited first in the list 
above, [\ke M. Puvis' reasoning in general, furnishes 
ample proof that most of the volatile parts of vegeta- 
bles, and the greater part of their bulk, are drawn 
from the atmosphere — and they are equally defective 
in proving that earths and other fixed prmciples arc 
thence derived, or are formed by the power of vegeta- 
ble life. Distilled water is not entirely free from 
earthy matter, and if it had been used lor watering 
the willow, it would in five years have "iven some 
considerable part of the five pounds of solid matter in 
the ashes. But as we are not told that it was either 
distilled or rain water, it may be inferred that the 
couiparatively impure water of a fountain or stream, 
was used for watering the plant, and which would 
more than suffice in so long a time to convey the 
whole increase of earthy and saline matter. The ex- 
periments of Lampadiua and Shrader are liable to the 
same objection — and the former to this in addition — 
that his earths were deemed absolutely pure, when, 
in all probability, they were not so- -and that a very 
•light admixture of other kinds with each, would fur- 
nish the minute quantity that a small plant could take 
up during its short and feeble existence under the cir- 
cumstances stated. The results staled of the experi- 
ments of Braconnot, Saussure, and EinhofT, may be, 
and probably are, entirely correct — but they are fully 
explained by the doctrine of neutral soils, and need no 
support from, and give none to, our author's doctrine 
of tlie formation of hme by vegetable power. 

But though deeming M. Puvis allogether wrong 
in this, his main and most labored position, and that 
the proofs cited above, as well as some others in the 
preceding section, are of no worth, still these pages 
which present his theory, contain what is of more va- 
lue. He places in a strong pointof view the important 
truth that the atmosphere is the great treasury of na- 
ture, from which nature doubles and tribles the amount 
of all the small portions "iven lo the earth by the in- 
dustry of man. The author's scale of actual products 



38. The fertilizing effect of fallow, or 
ploughing, of moving and working tb« soilsi 
prove still more that all these circumstances 
determine the formation of fertilizing princi- 
ples, and probably of saline principles, in all 
tile parts of the soil which receive the atmo- 
spheric influences. 

But salts are also formed in plants. The 
nitrate of potash, which takes the place of su- 
gar in the beet — the oxalate of pottish, so 
abundant in sorrel — the carbonate of potash 
in fern, in the tops of potatoes, and in almost 
all vegetables in the first period of their life 
— the sulphate of potash in tobacco — the ni- 
trate of potash in turnsole and in pellilory 
— prove, without reply, tliat vegetation forms 
salts, as it forms the proper juices of plants, 
since the soil contains the one kind no more 
than the other. But can we say where plants 
take the elements necessary for all these 
formations t They can take them only in the 
soil by means of their roots, or in the atmo- 
sphere — in the soil, which would itself take 
them in the atmosphere, in proportion to the 
consumption of plants — or directly in the at- 
mosphere by means of their leaves, which 
would there gather these elements. And if 
the analyses of the soils, and of the atmo- 
sphere, show almost none of these elements, 
it will be necessary to conclude from it that 
the substances which analysis has found there, 
are themselves, or would furnish if decom- 
posed, the elements of the saline substances, 
although science may not yet have taught us 
the means of reaching that end. 

39. The formation of lime, like that of 
the saline principles necessary to plants, is an 
operation which employs all tho forces of ve- 
getation — and these forces, directed to this 
formation, have no energy left to give a great 
developement to plants : but when the vege- 
table finds the calcareous principles already 
formed in the soil, it makes use of them, and 
preserves all its forces to increase its own 
vigor and size. 

It would then result, from all that has 
been said, that lime modifies the texture of 
the soil — makes it more friable — invigorates 
it — renders it more permeable — gives it the 
power to better resist moisture as well as dry- 
ness — that it produces in the soil the humate 
of lime which encloses a powerful means of 
fertility — that lime increases much the energy 
of the soil and of plants to draw from the atmo- 
sphere the volatile substances of which plants 

from different grades of soil is also interesting. It 
sustains the position assumed in the Essay on Calca- 
reous Manures, that the worst soils are limed (or made 
calcareous) to most profit — and that alimentary ma- 
nures, when needed, are most productive on the best 
soils, — [Ed. Far. Reg. 



33 



are composed, oxygen, hydrogen, carbon, 
nnd azote — that the limed soil in furnishing 
to plants the lime which they need, relieves 
the soil and plants from employmg their 
powers to produce it — and finally, that lime 
promotes the formation of fixed substances, 
earthy or saline, necessary to vegetables. 
All this whole of reciprocal action and reac- 
tion of lime, on the soil, plants, and atmo 
sphere, explains in a plausible manner its fer- 
tilizing properties. We would, consequently, 
have nearly arrived at the resolving of an im- 
portant agricultural problem, upon which were 
accumulated all these doubts. 

The amount of lime taken up by vegetation. 

40. The ashes of plants from calcareous 
soils, or those which have been made so by 
manures, contain 30 per cent, of the carbon- 
ate and phosphate of lime, which, by taking 
off" the crop, is lost to the soil. But the pro- 
duct of limed land of middle quality, is during 
the two years of the course of crops, about 
20,0001bs. of dry products to the hectare, 
which contain a little less than a hectolitre of 
lime in the calcareous compounds of the 
ashes. The vegetation has then used half a 
hectolitre a year. But we have shown that 
there was necessary, on an average, three 
hectolitres per hectare each year. Vegeta- 
tion then does not take up, in nature, but a 
sixth of the lime which is given profitably to 
the soil ; the other five-sixths are lost, are 
carried away by the water, descend to the 
lower beds of earth, are combined, or serve 
to form other compounds, perhaps even the 
saline compounds, of which we have seen 
that lime so powerfully favors the formation. 
Another portion, also, without doubt, remains 
in the soil, and serves to form this reserve, 
which in the end dispenses, for many years, 
with the repetition of liming. 

Of the exhaustion of the soil by liming. 

41. " Lime," it is said, " only enriches the 
old men : or it enriches fathers and ruins 
sons." This is indeed what experience 
proves, when, on light soils, hmed heavily, or 
without composts coming between, succes- 
sive grain crops have been made without rest, 
without alternations of grass crops, or without 
giving to the soil alimentary manures in suit- 
able proportion. It is also what has happen- 
ed when magnesia, mixed with lime, has car- 
ried to the soil its exhausting stimulus. But 
when lime has been used in moderation — 
when, without overburdening the land with 
exhausting crops, they have been alternated 
with green crops — and when manure has 



been given in proportion to the products taken 
oft'— the prudent cultivator then sees continue 
the new fecundity which the lime has brought, 
without the soil showing any sign of exhaus- 
tion. No where has there been complaint 
made of argillaceous soils being damaged by 
lime ; and the productiveness of light soils is 
sustained in every case that the lime was used 
in compost. 

In America, where the lime of oyster shells 
has taken the place of that of magnesian 
limestone, the complaints of the exhausting 
effects of lime have ceased. 

Healthiness given to the soil and to the coun- 
try by calcareous agents.* 

42. The unhealthiness of a country is not 
caused by the accumulation of water, nor from 
soil being covered by water. Places on the 
borders of water do not become sickly except 
when the water has quitted some part of the 
surface which it previously overflowed, and 
the summer's sun heats the uncovered soil, 
and causes the decomposition of the remains 
of all kinds of matter left by the water, and 
contained in the upper layers of the soil. 
Thus, ponds are not unhealthy except when 
drought, by lowering the waters, leaves ex- 
tensive margins bare, to be acted on by the 
sun and air. In rainy years, fevers on the 
borders of ponds are rare. 

Epidemic diseases most often arise on the 
borders of marshes laid dry — in the neigh- 
borhood of mud thrown out of ditches or pits 
— and in the course of bringing new land into 
cultivation, where the ploughed soil is for the 
first time exposed to the summer's sun. In 
the interior of Rome, the vineyards, the gar- 
dens are remarkably unhealthy — while the 
sickliness disappears where the emanations 
from the soil are prevented by buildings. In 
the Pontine marshes, they cover the dried parts 
with water to arrest the danger of their efflu- 
via. It is then from the soil, and not from the 
waters at its surface, that insalubrious emana- 



* There was no position in the Essay on Calcareous 
Manures which its author assumed wiih so much hesi- 
tation as the agency of those manures in removing 
causes of disease. Tliat hesitation did not arise from 
doubt of the truth of the position — but because of its 
very high importance and its entire novelty — its be- 
ing then sustained but by few known facts furnishing 
direct evidence, and by no known authority whatever 
of earher writers. It is therefore the more gratifying 
to find in tile work now presented, that about the same 
time, another and far remote investigator of the same 
subject, by a different course of reasoning, and by dif- 
ferent proofs, had arrived at precisely the same con- 
clusion — and that he maintains, even more generally 
than the former work, the important and sure effects 
of calcareous manures in rendering a country more 
healthy. [Tb.J 



34 



tions proceed. Waters placed on the sur- 
face, always in motion, agitated by every 
wind, are not altered in quality, and do not 
become unhealthy ; but whenever they are 
contained in some place without power to re- 
ceive exterior influences, or to have motion, 
they are altered in their odor, taste, and con- 
sequently injured in relation to health. 

Whenever water then, without covering the 
soil, penetrates the upper layer without being 
able to run through the subsoil, it remains 
without motion, and stagnant, within the soil 
— is changed by the summer's sun, serves to 
hasten the putrefaction of the broken down 
vegetable remains in or on the mould, and 
the exhalations from the ground become un- 
healthy. Thus are all drained marshes, of 
which the surface only is dry, while the water 
still penetrates the subsoil — thus, all the mar- 
gins of rivers which have been covered by re- 
cent inundations of summer, are unhealthy ; 
thus also, (for a great and unhappy example,) 
the argilo-silicious plateaux, whenever the 
closeness of the subsoil does not let the wa- 
ter pass through, produce, in dry years, at the 
close of summer, emanations which attack 
the health of the inhabitants. 

43. But this unhappy effect appears al- 
most no where in calcareous regions : the 
margins of lakes and ponds there situated do 
not produce the same unhealthiness, and 
even the marshy grounds there are less un- 
healthy. 

The waters which spring out of, or run 
over calcareous beds, are always healthy to 
drink. The borers of Artesian wells are 
anxious that the water which they obtain, to 
be good, may come out of the calcareous 
strata which they go through. AVhen tho 
waters which hold carbonate of lime in solu- 
tion in carbonic acid* run over the surface, 
they give health to the meadows, in changing 
the nature and quantity of the products. 

Linnxus thought that the unhealthiness of 
most countries depended on the nature of the 
water, and was owing to the argillaceous par- 
ticles which they contain ; now these argilla- 
ceous particles are always precipitated by the 
calcareous compounds. For this reason, the 
waters which stand upon, or run over marl 
or calcareous rock, are almost always limpid 
and clear, because the argillaceous particles 
have been precipitated by the effect of the 
solution in the water of the calcareous princi- 

* As in limestone water, lime with the greatest 
proportion with which it can combine of carhonic acid, 
(forming super-carbonate of lime,) is soluble in water. 
The excess of acid is lost by heat, by exposure to air, 
&c., and then the lime is in form of carbonate — and 
l>elng insoluble in water, falls separate to the bottom. 
ITr.J 



pie, which ia itself diaeolved by an excess of 
carbonic acid. 

We are not far from believing then, that 
throwing rich marl, or limestone, into a well 
of muddy and brackish water, might have the 
effect, in part at least, of clearing it, and mak- 
ing it healthy to drink. This remedy, if it 
should not be as useful as we think, at least 
could not produce any injury. 

Lime, in all its combinations, destroys the 
miasmata dangerous to life. Its chloride an- 
nihilates all bad odors, arrests putrefaction, 
and in short, has subjected tho plague of 
Egypt to the skill and courage of Parisot. 
The white wash of lime upon infected build- 
ings, upon the walls and mangers of sta- 
bles, is regarded as serving to destroy the 
contagious miasmata of epidemic and epi- 
zootic diseases. 

Lime destroys the plants of humid and 
marshy soils, and makes those suitable to 
better soils spring up : tlien its effect is to 
give healthiness or vigor to the soil, to dry it, 
and make it more mellow and permeable. 
The water then is no longer without motion, 
and altered consequently in its condition. 
The limed soil then, to the depth it is plough- 
ed, ought to change the nature of its emana- 
tions as well as its products : and if the lower 
strata or subsoil, send up emanations, these 
effluvia, in passing through the improved 
layers of soil, where the calcareous agent is 
always at work and developing all its affini- 
ties, ought also to be modified, and take the 
character of those of the upper bed. The 
hmed soil then, it would seem, ought to be 
made healthy. 

But what we maintain here by induction, 
by reasoning, is fortunately a fact of exten- 
sive experience. Among all the countries 
in which lime has carried and established fer- 
tility, there is not cited, that I know of, a sin- 
gle one where intermittent fevers prevail — 
while they have never disappeared in a coun- 
try even where an active culture draws good 
products from the impermeable argilo-sili- 
cious soil. 

44. To extend the great benefit of healthi- 
ness to the whole of a country, it is no doubt 
necessary that the whole country should re- 
ceive the health-giving agent. However, on 
every farm, in proportion as liming is extend- 
ed over its surface, the chances of disease 
will be seen to diminish — and the healthiness 
of the country will keep pace with the pro- 
gress of its fertility. 

Result of the use of improving manures on 
ike soil of France in general. 
Three-fourths of the whole territory of 
France, to be rendered fruitful, have need 



^ 



25 



of calcareous agents. If the third of this 
extent has already received them, (which we 
believe is above the truth,) upon the other 
two-thirds, or the half of the whole, the agri- 
cultural products, by this operation, would be 
increased one-half or more, or one-fifth of 
the total amount. But agriculture, in en- 
riching itself will increase its power, its ca- 
pital, and its population ; and will naturally 
carry its exuberant forces, its energy and ac- 
tivity to operate on the greater part of the 
7,000,000 of hectares of land now [^enfriche] 
untiUed, waste, and without product. By 
bringing these lands into cultivation and fer- 
tilizing them by liming, or by paring and burn- 
ing the surface, they would be made to yield 
at least one-sixth of the total product. The 
gross product of the French soil, then increas- 
ed by a third or more, might also give employ- 
ment and sustenance to a population one-third 
greater than France now possesses ; and 
this revolution due successively to the tillage 
of the soil, to annual improvements keeping 
pace with the progressive increase of crops, 
would be insensible. The state would grow 
in force, in vigor, in wealth, in an active and 
moral population, which would be devoted to 
peace, and to the country, because it would 
belong to this new and meliorated soil. And 
this great result would be owing simply to 
applying calcareous manures to the extent of 
the soils of France which require them ! 

46. Upon our extent of 64,000,000 of hec- 
tares, our population, increased to 44,000,000, 
would have for each, one hectare and a quar- 
ter, and would be less confined than the 
24,000,000 of inhabitants of the English soil, 
who have only one hectare to the head ; and 
yet our soil is at least as good, and it is more 
favored by climate. And then our neigh- 
bors consume in their food at least a fourth 
or fifth of meat, while only one-fifleenth of 
the food of our population consists of meat ; 
and as there is required twelve or fifteen times 
the space to produce meat as bread, it follows 
that twice the extent of soil is necessary to 
support an Englishman as a Frenchman. 
Hence it results, that with an increase of one- 
third, our population would still have a large 
surplus product which would not exist in 
England, with an equal increase of popula- 
tion and equal increase of products of agri- 
culture. 

But this prosperity of the country, (yet far 
distant, but towards which, however, we will 
be advanced daily,) would be still much less 
than in the department of the North, where a 
hectare nearly supports two inhabitants. And 
yet they have more than a sixth of their soil 



in woods, marshes, or unproductive lands : 
they have, besides, another sixth, and of their 
best ground, in crops of commerce, which 
consume a great part of their manure, and 
which are exported almost entirely. This 
prodigious result is, without doubt, owing in 
part to a greater extent of good soil than is 
found elsewhere ; but it is principally owing 
there, as well as in England, to the regular 
use of calcareous manures. As we have 
seen, more than two-thirds of this country 
[the North] belongs to the class of soils not 
calcareous, to the argilo-siliciousplateaux,and 
makes use of lime, marl, or ashes of all kinds. 

47. After this great result of increased pro- 
ductiveness, that upon health, although appli- 
ed to the least extents of surface, would be 
most precious. Upon one-sixth of our coun- 
try the population is sickly, subject to intermit- 
tent and often fatal fevers, and the deaths ex- 
ceed in number the births. Well ! upon this 
soil without marshes, calcareous manures 
would bring a growing population, more nu- 
merous than that of our now healthy parts of 
the country — and as labor would offer itself 
from every side, these regions, made healthy, 
would soon be those where the people would 
be most happy, the richest, and the most ra- 
pidly increasing in numbers. 

48. If we are not under an illusion, the 
calcareous principle and its properties upon 
the soil, form the great compensation accord- 
ed by the Supreme Author to man, in con- 
demning him to till the earth. Three-fourths 
of our soil, seem not to produce, except by 
force of pain and labor, the vegetables abso- 
lutely necessary for man. On all sides, and 
often beneath this surface so little favored, 
is found placed the substance necessary 
to the soil to render it as fertile as the best 
ground, to enable the cultivator to use for his 
profit the vegetable mould which it contains 
and has been accumulating for ages — and to 
cause the entire soil to be covered by a popu- 
lation active, moral, and well employed. And 
this precious condiment, this active principle 
of vegetation, is only needed to be applied 
in small proportions, to obtain products of 
which the first harvest often compensates for 
all the labor and expense. And to complete 
the benefit, insalubrity, which afflicts the in- 
fertile soil, disappears ; the new population 
finds there at the same time strength, riches, 
and health. There, without doubt, is one of 
the most happy harmonies of the creation, 
one of the greatest blessings with which the 
Supreme Author has endowed the laborious 
man who is devoted to the cultivation of the 
earth. 



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